THE LIBRARY

OF

THE UNIVERSITY
OF CALIFORNIA

LOS ANGELES

//t fee fi

iqi±_

>Ui' V l~LC

HISTORICAL INTRODUCTIONS

TO

THE ROLLS SERIES

HISTORICAL INTRODUC-
TIONS TO THE ROLLS
SERIES. By WILLIAM STUBBS,

D.D., FORMERLY BISHOP OF OXFORD AND

COLLECTED AND EDITED BY

ARTHUR HASSALL, M.A.

STUDENT, TUTOR, AND SOMETIME CENSOR
OF CHRIST CHURCH

LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO.

39 PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON

NEW YORK AND BOMBAY

I9O2

All rights reserved

College
Library

PEBFACB

THE publication of the historical portions of the late
Bishop Stubbs' Introductions to certain volumes of the
Bolls Series is due to the courtesy of the Controller of
His Majesty's Stationery Office, who has given me permission
to collect in one volume those investigations of Bishop
Stubbs which are at present scattered among the numerous
volumes of the Rolls Series.

Historical students have for many years appreciated
the subtle delineations of character and the invaluable
suggestions and conclusions which are to be found in the
Bishop's Introduct;ons. The immense learning and the
critical acumen which appear on every page of his work are
too well known to need further mention.

Everyone, indeed, who is interested in English History in
the Middle Ages has recognised that in these Introductions
may be found the clue to much that is difficult to compre-
hend ; no sounder guide to the times of Henry II.,
Richard I., John, Edward I. and Edward II. has ever been
written ; but, unfortunately, the volumes of the Rolls Series
can as a rule only be consulted in some of our better equipped
libraries.

I imagine that no better tribute to the memory of the
late Bishop can be paid, and no greater boon conferred on
historical students, than to bring within their reach the
only possible means for a right understanding of the
Angevin period. Written in vigorous language, which is

VI PREFACE

always lucid and frequently eloquent, these Introductions
reveal to us a depth of learning, a knowledge of men and
affairs, and a fund of charity — so characteristic of Bishop
Stubbs.

No better judge of the value of Henry II. 's work ever
lived ; no historian has ever given us a truer and more
forcible picture of King John. It is to be hoped that
the perusal of these pages will induce many students to
consult the Chronicles, Memorials, and Historical Collec-
tions themselves, to explain which these Introductions
were written. These historical works are publisher!
in extenso in the Kolls Series, and many of the references
in the Introductions are to the volumes in that series.
Students ought to regard these Introductions as merely
steps to a further and more detailed investigation of the
Angevin period.

Probably no historian has ever lived who did more for
the study of English History than Bishop Stubbs. The
perusal of these Introductions will do much to enable
historical students in all parts of the world to appreciate
the debt which they owe to him, and to realise the true
value of accurate historical scholarship.

ARTHUR HASSALL.

CUUIST CHCUCH, Oxvom>:
October 1!»02.

CONTENTS

PAGE

MEMOEIALS OF SAINT DUNSTAN, ARCHBISHOP OP CANTER-

BURY

THE HISTORICAL WORKS OF MASTER RALPH DE DICETO,

DEAN OF LONDON 85

THE CHRONICLE OF THE REIGNS OF HENRY II. AND
RICHARD I., A.D. 1169-1192 ; KNOWN COMMONLY UNDER THE
NAME OF BENEDICT OF PETERBOROUGH— VOL. II. . . 89

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN— VOL. II. . . . 173
THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN— VOL. III. . . .200
THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN— VOL. IV. . . 260

CHRONICLES AND MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

—VOL. I., ITINERARIUM 310

CHRONICLES AND MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

—VOL. II., EPISTOL-E CANTUARIENSES, A.D. 1187-1199 . . . 306

THE HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS OF WALTER OF COVENTRY . 489

CHRONICLES OF THE REIGNS OF EDWARD I. AND EDWARD II.

—VOL. 1 488

CHRONICLES OF THE REIGNS OF EDWARD I. AND EDWARD II.

—VOL. II 505

INDEX . . 529

MEMOEIALS OF SAINT DUNSTAN,
AECHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY

[!N the first seventy-two pages of the Introduction to the ' Memorials of
Saint Dunstan ' Bishop Stubbs draws attention to the importance of
Dunstan as a historical personage, and then discusses the value of the
various biographies of the Archbishop. The Priest B., Adelard, Osbern,
Eadmer, and William of Malmesbury wrote lives of Dunstan, and their
works are here subjected to a careful criticism. The relation of these
biographies to the Chronicles — ' the more weighty and direct evidences of
our national history ' — is then touched upon. ' The determination of the
chronology and the identification of the places and persons that come
into Dunstan's history ' is not, according to Bishop Stubbs, a very easy
task, as the authorities are vague on each point.]

******
DUNSTAN is said to have ' sprung to light ' in the reign of Date of ^
Athelstan. We may question whether the word ' oritur ' l refers to birth
his birth or to his coming before the eye of history, in what year of
Athelstan's reign the event took place, and in what year Athelstan
began to reign. All our authorities agree in referring the word
to Dunstan's birth. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicles, which Osbern
follows, fix the first year of Athelstan as the date, and for that first
year we have to choose between 924 and 925, the former date being
given in four MSS. of the Chronicle and by Florence of Worcester,
the latter by two MSS. of the Chronicle. Unfortunately the exact
date of the death of Edward the Elder is unknown, but, as Athelstan
in his charters speaks of 929 2 as bis sixth year, his first must at all

1 See B. p. 6 ; Flor. Wig. A.D. 924 ; the eighth year, ibid. 1007. If these
Chr. S. A.D. 924, 925. dates are calculated on one principle,

2 Alford had seen a charter in his reigii must have begun after Nov.
which 925 is called the first year of 12, 924 ; but I should not venture to
Athelstan, Annales, iii. 242 : — A.D. 929 take this for granted. The reign of
is, the sixth year in Kemble, Cod. Dipl., Athelstan lasted, according to the
Nos. 347, 348. A.D. 931, Nov. 12, is MS. Tiberius A. 3, fourteen years and
in the seventh year, ibid. 353 ; A.D. seven weeks and three days, which,
934, May 28, is in the tenth year, ibid. calculated back from Oct. 27, 940, the
364; A.D. 931, Mar. 23, is in the day of his death, would fix his corona-
seventh year, ibid. 1102; and July 31 tion about the first week in September,
also, ibid. 1103; A.D. 932, Aug. 28, is in 926. The Chronicle gives him a

MEMORIALS OF S. DUNSTAN

His parents

His con-
nexion with
the royal
bouse

His other
relations

Kynedritha

Wulfric

events have begun in 924. Alford places Dunstan's birth in the
spring of 925, arguing that if his mother were pregnant in February,
as must be supposed to have been the case if Adelard's miracle of
the candles has any semblance of truth, and if Athelstan's accession
took place about the middle of the year 924, the child must have
been born in 925. l And this computation is borne out by an entry
in an ancient Anglo-Saxon Paschal Table, preserved in the Cotton
MS., Caligula A. 15, under the year 925, ' on thison geare waes see
Dunstan geboren.' The matter is not in itself of great importance,
but it is complicated with questions touching the date of archbishop
Atholm, and the age at which Dunstan took holy orders.

Dunstan's parents were, as the Saxon priest tells us, Heorstan
and Kynedritha ; his near kinsmen were among the ' palatini ' or
members of the court and household of Athelstan ; Elfege the Bald,
bishop of Winchester, and bishop Kinesige of Lichfield, were also
near relations. Dunstan had a brother named Wulfric. The great
lady Ethelfleda was also connected with him by the ties of relation-
ship, and she was of royal descent, being Athelstan's niece. These
circumstances certainly give some foundation for the statement of
Dunstan's nobility, made by the later biographers, who, however,
have a strong tendency to define what the earlier writer has left
indefinite. Adelard goes further, making archbishop Athelm his
uncle. Osbern and Eadmer make his parents noble, and turn the
lady Ethelfleda into Elfgifu or ^Ethelgifu. They also ignore the
existence of Wulfric, making Dunstan an only son.

The probability is in favour of Dunstan's noble birth. Of
Heorstan nothing more is known, but Kynedritha is very probably
the same as Keondrud, a lady whose name is found among those
members of Athelstan's court who were made partakers of the
prayers of the monks of S. Gall, when in the year 929 they were
visited by bishop Kynewald of Worcester.2 Wulfric, who is described

most have been crowned two years
after his reign began, which is im-
probable. Perhaps the day may yet
turn up in some monastic kalendar.
It is, however, very curious that all
the ancient regnal lists give him a
reign of only fourteen years.

reign of fourteen years and ten weeks,
which may have been calculated from
his father's death, and would fix that
event about August 10:— if for four-
teen we read sixteen, Edward's death
would be determined on or about
August 20, 924; if not, Athelstan

1 Annales, iii. 242.

2 The form is printed by Goldastus in the Scriptores Rerum Alamanni-
carum, vol. ii. part II. p. 153, and also in the Appendix to the Report on the
Fcedera. It is so closely connected with Dunstan's period that it is worth while
to give it entire : —

' Anno ab Incarnatione Domini 928, indictione ii. (lege 929) Keonwald
venerabilis cpiscopus profectus ab Anglis, omnibus monasteriis per totam
Germaniam, cum oblatione de argento non modica, et in id ipsum rege
Anglorum eadem sibi tradita, visitatis, in idibus Octobris venit ad monasterium
Sancti Galli ; quique gratissime a fratribus susceptus et ejusdem patroni nostri

MEMORIALS OF S. DUNSTAN 3

as managing the secular affairs of Glastonbury under the title of
prsepositus or reeve, may also with some probability be identified
with Wulfric, the ' comes ' or ' gesith ' of the kings Edmund and
Edred, to whom many grants of land were made which ultimately
became the property of Glastonbury. The estates thus bestowed
were situated at Idemestone, Nellington, Grutelington, Langleath,
and other places not far from Glastonbury, and the gifts may possibly
have been made with the intention of their being appropriated to
the monastery ; they begin as early as 940, when Dunstan could
scarcely have become abbot, and Wulfric the recipient must have
been an elder brother, if he were brother at all. Another glimpse
of him may be caught in a curious MS. of the Irish collection of
canons, now among the Hatton MSS. in the Bodleian, entitled
' Liber Sancti Dunstani,' which belongs to the date, possibly to the
school or hand of Dunstan. The scribe has drawn in one place the
head of a boy, in rubric, with the name ' Wulfric Gild.'

The lady Ethelfleda bears a name too common among the
Anglo-Saxons to furnish any basis for identification, and the fact
that she is called Athelstan's niece scarcely helps the inquiry. A
certain lady, ^Ifleda, has, like Wulfric, grants of land from Athelstan
and Edmund,1 which came to the same monastery. This lady is
not to be identified with Ethelfleda of Mercia, Athelstan's aunt,

festivitatem cum illis celebrando, quatuor ibidem dies demoratus est. Secundo
autem, postquam monasteriuin ingressus est, hoc est in ipso depositionis
S. Galli die, basilicam intravit et pecuniam secum copiosam attulit, de qua
partem altario imposuit, partem etiam utilitati fratrum donavit. Posthteceo in
conventum nostrum inducto, omnis congregatio concessit ei annonam unius
fratris, et tandem orationem quam pro quolibet de nostris, sive vivente,
sive vita decedente, facere solemus pro illo facturam perpetualiter promisit.
Base sunt autem nomina quffl conscribi jussit vel rogavit : rex Anglorum Adal-
stean, Kenowald episcopus, Wigharth, Kenwor, Conrat, Keonolaf, Wundych,
Keondrud.' A longer list appears in the general catalogue of the Fratres
Conscripti (Goldast. p. 156) : —

' Hie regis Angli« et comitum suornm nomina denotata sunt ;
Adalsten, Eex. Wolfhelmus, archiepisc. Elwinus, episc. Eotkarus, episc.
Winsige, episc. Sigihelm, episcopus. Oda, episcopus. Fridosten, episc.
Kenod, abba. Albrich, abba. Cudret. Erdulf.

Fridolef. Wulfun. Ortgar. Osfred. Elfsie.

Adalwerd. Elwin. Adalwin. Berectwin. Wulfilt.

Wighart. Conrat. Kenwin. Wundrud. Kenowald, episc.

Kenolaf. Keondrud.'

cum ceteris.

The bishops are Wulfhelm of Canterbury ; Elfwin of Lichfield ; Edgar of
Hereford ; Winsige of Dorchester ; Sigelm of Sherborne ; Odo of Eamsbury ;
Frithstan of Winchester ; and Kynewold of Worcester. Of the abbots, Kenod
belongs to Evesham or Abingdon, and Cudret to Glastonbury. Elfric, abbot
(Albrich); Osferth, ealdorman ; Wulfhun, bishop; Wihtgar, minister; and
others may be identified with the witnesses of Athelstan's charters.

1 MS. Wood, I. folios 223, 240 ; Kemble, C. D. No. 389, where she is called
' religiosa feemina.'

B2

MEMORIALS OF 8. DUNSTAN

Called also

Relation
between
Athcliu and
Duns tan

Question
an to
Wulfhelm

who died in 922 at the latest, nor with Ethelfleda of Damerham, the
second wife of king Edmund ; nor with Eadileda, Athelstan's sister.
Ethelfleda of Romsey, abbess, virgin, and patron saint, cannot, if
her recorded history be true, have been the widowed friend of
Dunstan. The main part, however, of the history of the abbess of
Romsey is apocryphal, and the dates assigned to her are inconsistent
with one another. It is therefore possible that she was the person
whom we are seeking. She is said to have been the daughter of an
ealdorman Ethelwold and his wife Brihtwina.1 If this ealdorman
be identical with Elfweard, Athelstan's brother, who died in 924, his
daughter would be the king's niece ; but this is barely probable.
The fact that Osbern and Eadmer give her the name of Ethelgifu
or Elfgifu would show that in their time no such identity was
recognised, nor can the latter name with any probability be regarded
as the true one, although the practice assigned to her, of ministering
of her goods to the kings and the seed royal, does curiously coincide
with the office which has been with great probability ascribed to that
more famous Ethelgifu 2 who exercised so baneful an influence on the
career of king Edwy. We know Ethelfleda only on the testimony of
the Saxon priest, who, however, distinctly asserts her relationship with
both Dunstan and Athelstan.

Our earliest authority does not determine the degree of relation-
ship between Elfege, Kinesige, and Dunstan, but Adelard makes
Athelm, archbishop of Canterbury, the brother of Heorstan. In this
by itself there is nothing improbable ; Athelm had been bishop of
Wells, and was very likely to have been connected with the royal
family, as one at least of his successors was ; his name occurs also
in the list of bishops given by William of Malmesbury as having been
monks of Glastonbury.3 Adelard, however, is so manifestly mistaken
in making him the patron as well as uncle of Dunstan, that no
weight can be attached to his evidence. Athelm died either when
Dunstan was a baby, or before he was born.4 Wulfhelm, who suc-
ceeded him, had likewise been bishop of Wells, and among the Dun-
stan letters there is found a copy of verses addressed to him, which
may point to some connexion between the two, but he is nowhere

1 Her life is in Capgrave, abridged
from the MS. Lanad. 436. See Hardy,
Catalogue, &c. i. 568.

* Robertson, Historical Essays, pp.
200 sq.

1 Ant. Glast. ap. Gale, p. 324.

4 There are no genuine charters to
which the name of Athelm is attached.
The name of Wulfhelm, his successor,
appears in 923 and onwards. The

statement of Florence (A.D. 924) that
Athelm crowned Athelstan is derived
from Adelard, p. 55. If the evidence
of charters as to Wulfhelm in 923 be
rejected, still it is certain that Athelm
was dead long before Dunstan could
have gone to court. See Chr. 8. A.D.
924, 925, from which it would Beem
that Athelm and Edward the Elder
died the same year.

MEMOEIALS OF S. DUNSTAN 5

said to have been connected with Glastonbury, or to have been a
patron of Dunstan.

Glastonbury, or its immediate neighbourhood, was the place of Dunstan
the saint's birth and early teaching ; he was a pupil of the Irish ^ Gfc£
pilgrims who had taken up their abode at the resting-place of the tonbury
younger Patrick.1 Whilst quite a boy he lived also in the palace of Dunstan's
Athelstan, at no great distance from Glastonbury, it would seem, as eary l
he had already received the tonsure, and was serving in the church
of S. Mary, in which he had been baptized. After his expulsion
from Athelstan's court, he stayed a long time at Winchester with
Elfege, who prevailed on him to become a monk. After this we
again find him at Glastonbury in attendance on the lady Ethelfleda,
who had built herself a house there, and who left her estates to be
disposed of by him. He next appears in attendance on king Edmund
at Cheddar, and, after a short disgrace, is made by him abbot of
Glastonbury, in which office he continues until he is made bishop.

For this part of Dunstan's life we have very few dates. Athel- Date of t
stan died in the year 940, when Dunstan would be about sixteen, no appointment
doubt a clever, somewhat precocious boy, whose dreams and prayers bury*
might very likely expose him to the rough treatment of his play-
fellows. His appointment to Glastonbury is placed by the Canter-
bury copy of the Chronicle in the year 943, and by Florence of
Worcester, whose authority, if independent of that copy, is preferable,
under the date 942, but only as one of the remarkable acts of king
Edmund. The direct evidence being so slight, we may rest on the
authority of the charters, in which Dunstan as abbot appears among
the witnesses only in 946, the year of Edmund's death. The only
charter of earlier date in which he is mentioned is one of the year
940, which is apparently admitted by Kemble as genuine, and which
is a grant, made to him as abbot, of land at Christian Malford.2
But although this document has no overt evidence of fabrication, it
is found only in a copy, like the other Glastonbury charters, and
either the name of Dunstan or the title of abbot may have been an
insertion of the copyist. Dunstan, as one of the sons of the nobles,
might have had a grant of folkland at sixteen, the age at which the
young warrior received his arms ; but it is very improbable that if he had

1 The Arras MS. says the younger Patricius senior, who is said to have

Patrick, the other two MSS. the elder been bishop second in succession after

Patrick. This is a trace of the growth the great Patrick, and who might

of the legend that connects Patrick safely be called either senior or junior,

with Glastonbury, and may be the I cannot take on myself to decide. By

germ of the tradition. Whether the William of Malmesbury's time Glas-

later MSS. altered junior into senior tonbury claimed not only the great

in the idea of enhancing the greatness Patrick but his successor Benignus.
of Glastonbury, or whether the writers 2 Kemble, C. D. No. 384.
knew of the existence of Saen-Patric,

6

MEMORIALS OF 8. DUNSTAN

Condition of
Olastonbury

Antiquity
claimed for
Glastoiitmry
in later
times

Fabricated
evidence

True evi-
dence on
the point,

then become abbot, and that in a church so near the royal court, his
name should not appear in the charters for six years longer.1 I think,
however, that the date cannot be thrown later than 946, and I see
in the chronology no difficulties that need hinder the belief in the story
of Edmund's hunt in Cheddar as substantially true.

A more important point, perhaps, and certainly a more interest-
ing one, is the condition of Glastonbury at this time ; and although
it cannot be touched on here except in the most cursory manner, it
cannot be dismissed with a word. The Saxon priest represents it as
an ancient sanctuary, a retired spot possessing a church to which a
more than human origin was ascribed, a holy place to which
Athelstan resorted for the purpose of prayer, a place of pilgrimage
colonised by Irishmen, who had gathered at the tomb of Patrick.
As the place of Dunstan's birth, education, and promotion, Glaston-
bury had a later history, much of which is coloured by its con-
nexion with the Canterbury saint ; it became a rich abbey, and laid
claim to an early history and remote antiquity ; not content with
claiming the senior as well as the junior Patrick, it adopted Joseph
of Arimathea as its first founder, and produced evidence of its exist-
ence and sanctity under kings and in times long anterior to the
West Saxon rule ; not only Edmund the Magnificent ruler of Britain,
and Edgar the Peaceful, and Edmund Ironside, but king Arthur
himself slept there. Such claims doubtless provoked criticism, and
criticism forced on the monks the need of a forged history to assert,
and of forged monuments to support them. And the fabrication of
such evidences must have gone on at Glastonbury on a scale pro-
portioned to these claims. Westminster claimed the apostle Peter
as its founder, but that by a miracle. S. Alban's rejoiced in the
protomartyr of Britain, but contented itself with Offa as the restorer
rather than the founder of its greatness. But Glastonbury would
have a history without a miracle, and a continuous existence which
needed no restoration. William of Malmesbury, it would almost
seem, undertook to erect the story out of materials which he dis-
trusted, but this did not content his employers, and they interpolated
his work to a degree which makes it impossible to rely with confidence
upon any part of it.

The later developments, however, of Glastonbury history need not
make us shut our eyes to such early evidence as is afforded by the
Saxon priest. Further, we have in a MS. of the same date, or even

1 Dunstan attests only one charter
of Edmund : No. 406, marked by
Kcmble as suspicious, a grant to
Ethelnoth, in the Olastonbury Cartu-
lary : ' ego Dunstan abbas nolens scd

regalibus obediens verbis bane cartu-
lam scribere jussi.' Mr. Robertson
regards as his first historical appear-
ance his attestation to a charter of
Edred in 946, Eemble, C. D. 411.

MEMOKIALS OF S. DUNSTAN

a few years later, a list of the abbots of Glastonbury, which runs up
to the age of Ina.1 Ethelwerd mentions the coanobium of Glaston-
bury as the burial-place of the ealdorman Eanulf ; 2 its early history
is indeed unnoticed by Bede, or by the authors of the chronicle, but
its existence as a monasterium is proved by an incontrovertible
authority, the letters of S. Boniface, and the life of the same great
West Saxon saint written by his countryman and disciple S. Willi-
bald.3 And this mention by S. Boniface carries us back to the days
of Ina, who according to William of Malmesbury, writing apart
from Glastonbury influences, was the founder, and to the early
abbots of the ancient list just mentioned. And the certainty of this

1 It is very useful, in order to get an idea of the Glastonbury workmanship,
to compare the list of abbots given in the Tiberius MS. with that given by
William of Malmesbury, and the few dates ascertainable from early historians
and charters with the elaborate array of years which he produces, possibly in
some degree from the same materials.
Tiberius B. 5.

Early

1. Hsemgils.

2. Wealhstod

3. Coengils.

4. Beorhtwald

5. Cealdhun.

6. Muca

7. Wiccea.

8. Bosa.

9. Stitheard.

10. Herefyrth.

11. Hunbeorht.

12. Andhun.

13. Guthlac.

14. Cuthred

15. Ecgwulf.

16. Dunstan

17. Elfric.

18. Sigegar .

19. ^Elfweard

Bp. Hereford in 731
(Bede).

Contemporary with
S. Boniface, epist.

At the Council of
Clovesho in 805.

W. Malmesb. Ant. Glaston.
After five British !
abbots, Patrick,
Benignus, Wor- \
gret,Lademund, i
andBregored: —
1. Beorthwald

Confr. S. Gall, above,
p. 3.

A.D. 940 or 946-958.

Bp. of Wells in 975.
975 onwards.

2. Hemgisel

3. Beorwald

4. Aldbeorth

5. Atfrith .

6. Kemgisel

7. Guba .

8. Ticca .

9. Cuma

10. Walthun

11. Tumberth

12. Beadulf .

13. Muca .

14. Gutlac .

15. Ealmund

16. Herefyrth

17. Stiwerd .

18. Ealdhun

19. Elfric .

20. Dunstan
31. Elfward.
22. Sigar

670-680 ; abp.
Canterbury.
680-705.
705-712.
712-719.
719-729.
729-743.
743-744.
744-752.
752-754.
754-786.
786-795.
795-802.
802-824.
824-850.
850-866.
866-880.
880-905.
905-927.
927.
940.
962.
972.

The order and dates of Malmesbury's list seem to be quite at random ; yet
there is enough likeness between the two lists to show that he had older
materials to work upon.

2 Mon. Hist. Brit. p. 513.

3 There is a letter of Brihtwald,
archbishop of Canterbury, to Forthere,
bishop of Sherborne, referring to abbot
Beorwald (Mon. Moguntina, ed. Jaff£,
p. 48) ; this Beorwald is called by
Willibald abbot of Glastonbury ' cceno-

bium . . quod antiquorum nuncupatu
vocabulo Glestingaburg ' (ibid. 439) ;
and there is a letter from the priest
Wiehtberht to 'patribus et fratribus
in monasterio Glestingaburg con-
stitutis ' (ibid. 246), written during
the life of Boniface.

8

MEMORIALS OF 8. DUN8TAH

X> V- '. i:i''Tir- -

of the early
charters

Condition
of the
monartery

The Irish
pilgrims

Low state of
monachism
at the time

much of the early history gives probability to many of the charters,
the place of which in the Glastonbury Cartulary would afford by it-
self very little presumption of their credibility.

On such evidence we may assume that there was an ancient
ecclesiastical settlement at Glastonbury, dating from the seventh
century at the latest, which had shared the changes and experienced
the fate that had befallen most of the establishments of the centuries
of the conversion ; the churches and other buildings standing, the
libraries perhaps in a few cases continuing entire,1 but the monastic
life extinct, the name preserved only as giving a title to the owner-
ship of the lands, and the abbots and monks, if there were any that
called themselves so, being really secular priests and clerks.2 The
Irish pilgrims who instructed Dunstan may or may not have been
members or officers of this establishment, but the right of patronage
was clearly in the hands of the king, and the state of monastic rule,
discipline, and pretension was so attenuated that the contemporaries
of Dunstan regarded him as a founder rather than a reformer.
Monachism there was in England, although it was not after the
rule of S. Benedict, and a monk Dunstan had already become ; but
that Dunstan's monachism had little or nothing in common with
the state of things existing at Glastonbury at the time appears
from the words which the biographer puts in the mouth of Edmund :
' Be thou of this seat the lord and potent occupant, and whatsoever
from thine own means shall be lacking for the increase of divine
service, or for the completeness of the sacred rule, that I will supply
devoutly by my royal bounty.' 3 It is clear that the abbacy must

1 Asser's account of the state of the
monastic institute in Alfred's time was
true of the next half-century: 'per
multa retroacta annorum curricula
monastics vitas desiderium ab ilia tola
gente, necnon et a multis aliis genti-
bus funditus desierat, quamvis per-
plurima adhuc monasteria in ilia
regione constructa permaneant, nullo
tamen regulam illius vita; ordina-
biliter tenentc, nescio quare, aut pro
alienigenarum infestationibus . . .
aut etiara pro nimia illius gentis in
omni genere divitiarum abundantia,'
<fec. Mon. Hist. Brit. 493. According to
Alfred himself the books remained, but
there was no one who could use them.
Pref. to S. Gregory's Pastoral Care.

* Elfric the biographer of Ethel-
wold, the earliest describer of this
state of things, draws a sad picture of
the old Minster at Winchester, and
although it may be exaggerated it is
the testimony of an eye-witness :

' malemorigerati clerici, elatione et
insolentia ac luxuria praeventi, adeo
ut nonnulli eorum dedignarentur
missas suo ordine celebrare, repu-
diantes uxores, quas illicitc duxerant,
et alias accipientes, gulte etebrietati
jugiter dediti.' Hist. Abend, ii. 260.
The biographer of Oswald, after telling
us that Oswald bought himself ' mo-
nasterium quod est in Wintonia posi-
tum . . . donando digno pretio,' pro-
ceeds, ' in diebus illis non monastic!
viri neo ipsius sanctro institutionis
regul® erant in regione Anglorum,
sed erant religiosi et dignissimi clerici,
qui tamen thesauros suos quos avidis
adquirebant cordibus non ad ecclesinc
honorem sed suis dare solcbant uxori-
bus,' folio 4.

' Osbern's own expansion of the
speech is also worth noting. For
it is impossible to suspect either the
Saxon priest or Osbern of a desire to
undervalue the antiquity of Glaston-

MEMOKIALS OF S. DUNSTAN 9

have been vacant and the lands of the monastery in the king's hands, condition of
much as was the case at Abingdon at the same time. The words of Abingdon
the biographer of S. Ethel wold might be applied to the one as
well as to the other ; it ' was a place in which a little monastery had
been kept up from ancient days, but it was then desolate and neg-
lected, consisting of mean buildings and possessing only a few (in
the case of Abingdon, forty) hides ; the rest of the land of the place
the king possessed by his royal right.' l That is, there was still a
monastic establishment, but it had become ruinous and impoverished.
It was in name an abbey, but really served by clerks, or altogether
neglected. The renewal of discipline was really a foundation rather
than a revival.

The name of the abbot who had vacated the seat taken by Dun- Dunstan's
stan, as given by William of Malmesbury, is Elfric, the successor of Predecessor
Aldhun, under whom he says Dunstan had been educated. In the
ancient list, however, Dunstan's immediate predecessor is named
Ecgwulf ; and the next in order, counting backwards, is Cuthred,
whom I am inclined to identify with that ' Cudret ' who appears
among the courtiers of Athelstan in the compact with the monks of
S. Gall.

It might be difficult to define the monastic character that Dun- r
stan had assumed ; but it differed as much from the system which
it superseded as it did from the more perfect form into which it
ultimately grew. No doubt the name and dress of the monk were
resumed. Wulfred, Dunstan's early friend, is called a deacon, but
the companions of his retirement whilst he is abbot are called monks.
He himself in the famous drawing, which with very much probability
is ascribed to his own hand, appears in the dress of a monk. Yet
the establishment at Glastonbury under him is much more of a
school than a convent : the words ' scholasticus ' and ' discipulus '
come more naturally than 'monachus.' In this again there is
nothing peculiar to Glastonbury ; exactly the same processes are
traceable at Abingdon. I conclude that there had taken place, pro-
bably under the influence of Elfege the Bald, a strong tendency
towards pure Benedictinism : that tendency was represented by
Dunstan and Ethelwold in their early efforts, but it was not crowned
with success, or brought into perfect accord with the Benedictine
discipline, until Dunstan had seen the old rule in working at
Blandinium, and Oswald and Ethelwold had brought instructors
from Fleury. The difference between the laxer rule of Dunstan and
the stricter discipline of the other two may be partly attributed to
the difference of their foreign relations, partly also to the fact that

bury as compared with Canterbury. ' Elfric's Life of Ethelwold, Hist.

Comp. Eobertson, Hist. Essays, p. 190. Abend. Ji. 257.

10

MEMORIALS OF 8. DUNSTAN

Dunxtan'o
discipline
milder than
that of
Oiwald and
Ethelwold

Dans tan at
the court of
Edred

Court at
Winchester

Edred and
Odoln
relation to

mouachisni

Dunstan, being a statesman, and, after the accession of Edgar, in a
position of supreme importance, was obliged, whatever his own
wishes may have been, to avoid a policy of persecution. In the
biographies of Ethelwold and Oswald, Dunstan plays a part quite
secondary to theirs in the expulsion of the clerks from the monas-
teries ; and in his own churches, Canterbury, London, and Worcester,
he attempted no such measure : it is possible that he acted as a
check rather than a spur on the zeal of Edgar. At the same time it
cannot be supposed that the clerks were expelled without his per-
mission ; and although the stories of his active participation, detailed
by Osbern and Eadmer, were borrowed and adapted from the career
of Ethelwold, there is evidence enough in the first life to show that
he sympathised with the movement, and that his own life and per-
sonal influence were guided by an ascetic spirit.

Edmund reigned but a short time after Dunstan's appointment
as abbot, dying on May 26, 946. ' Edred, who succeeded him,
reigned until November 28, 955.2 The former king was eighteen
when he began to reign, twenty-four when he died. Edred must
have been within a year of the same age as Dunstan. These dates
help to reconcile us to the fact that Dunstan became abbot at twenty-
two. They serve to account for his close intimacy with Edred ; they
had been playfellows probably at the court of Athelstan. Edred
was a sickly young man ; the Saxon priest has drawn a picture of
his ill-health too graphic to be an invention of his own. His mother
Eadgifu was his chief adviser, and next to her Dunstan, who acted
as treasurer of the royal estates, and perhaps in an official position
somewhat like that of the later chancellors. His time was divided
between his abbey at Glastonbury, where he was teaching and
building, and his attendance on the king, who seemed to have kept
court, not in the western shires like Athelstan and Edmund, but
chiefly at Winchester. His reign was on the whole a successful
one ; for, whether by his own energy, by Dunstan's policy, or by the
divisions of his enemies, he acquired finally the allegiance of North-
umbria. It was, no doubt, during a visit paid with Edred to the
north that Dunstan saw the remains of S. Cuthbert.

It is to these years, no doubt, that Dunstan's period of active
teaching is to be referred. It was Edred who by his mother's advice
placed Ethelwold as abbot at Abingdon ; and this is the time of
Oswald's mission to Fleury.3 The part taken by archbishop Odo in
the government of the country has been obscured by the glory of the
younger men, and by the fact that his life was not written until a

Hist. Ramsey, Gale,

Chr. Sax. x.n. 946.

Ibid. A.I). 955.

Elfric's Life of Ethelwold, Chron.

Abend, ii. 257 ;
p. 391.

MEMOEIALS OF S. DUNSTAN 11

century and a half after his death. It is, however, certain that he
did nothing to thwart the policy of Dunstan, and enough of his
ecclesiastical legislation remains to show that, in a determination to
enforce the observance of both monastic vows and the laws of
marriage, he came in no degree behind his more famous successor.1

In 953, the death of Ethelgar, bishop of Crediton, gave Edred Proposal
and Eadgif u an opportunity of promoting Dunstan to the episcopate. Dunstan
It may or may not be true that, as Adelard relates, a like offer was a blshop
made to him on the death of Elfege the Bald in 951. He was not
yet of canonical age for consecration, and he refused the bishopric,
alleging as the reason, if we are to credit the later writers, his un-
willingness to leave the court as long as Edred lived. There can, I
think, be no doubt about this part of the story, or about the dream
which followed his refusal. Elfwold was appointed at his recom-
mendation to Crediton, and as bishop of Crediton Elfwold attests
the charters of Edred from 953 onwards.

Edred's death must have been sudden; he was at Frome;2 Date of
Dunstan, who was at Glastonbury, was summoned to attend him, but death *
the king died before he arrived, and the crown fell to Edwy, the elder
of the two sons of Edmund by his first wife Elfgifu.3 Edred's
reign is said in the table of the kings to have lasted nine years and six
weeks : 4 a computation which agrees but imperfectly with the dates
given by Florence of Worcester for his coronation and death, the
former event being placed on the 16th of August 946, and the latter
on the feast of S. Clement, November 23, 955. The rougher com-
putation of the Chronicle, nine years and a half, dating from the
death of Edmund, is nearer the mark.

As Edwy reigned three years, thirty-five weeks, and five days,5 uate of
and died on the 1st of October 959, his coronation must have taken ^onatio
place on the first or second Sunday after Epiphany, 956. He could
scarcely at this time have been more than fifteen years old. Dunstan
was still at court, and on him and his kinsman Kinesige G was thrown
the disagreeable task of bringing back the careless and obstinate boy,

1 See his Constitutions, published 6 Kinesige appears first in a char-
in the reign of Edmund, in Wilkins, ter of Athelstan to Abingdon,
Concilia, i. 212 sq. Kemble, C. D. 1129, as bishop of

3 Chron. Sax. A.D. 955. Berkshire. Berkshire was properly

3 Chron. Sax. A.D. 955 ; Mon. Hist. in the diocese of Kamsbury, of which
Brit. p. 662. Odo was bishop at the time. In the

4 MS. Tiberius, A. 3 ; Chr. S. ed. lists of bishops (M. H. B. 624) he is
Thorpe, i. 233. bishop of Lichfield ; he may have

s ' Four years less seven weeks,' been administering Berkshire for Odo

MS. Tiberius, B. 5 ; Eel. Ant. ii. 171 ; at the date of the earlier charter. He

' quadriennio ' Ethelwerd, p. 520 ; attests charters from 931 to 934, and

' three years, thirty-six weeks, less from 949-963 ; but possibly enough

two days, MS. Tiberius, A. 3 ; Thorpe, there were two persons of the name.
Chr. S. p. 233.

12

MEMORIALS OF S. DUNSTAN

Story of the
coronation

fOMt

Dunstan
in exile

Bdgar still
at court

Edgar be-
comes king
of Mercia

Dnnstan
made a

bishop

from the chamber of Ethelgifu and her daughter, to the solemn
banquet. On this event much has been written, and an amount of
criticism spent, altogether out of proportion to the materials for its
history.1 The narration of the Saxon priest is the primary authority ;
written forty years after the event, and not by an eye-witness, it bears
marks of having been coloured by popular tradition. The distinction
which I have already drawn, as to the narrative of our author, where
it concerns Dunstan's private history and where it touches on public
events, may be applied here. The monstrous lust of such a mere
child as Edwy was could not have been a main feature of a story
told by Dunstan himself, who knew the truth, and who, although he
had been persecuted by Ethelgifu, had no temptation to pervert facts.
The offence given to Dunstan may easily be accounted for by the
relationship of Edwy and Ethelgifu, and the bulk of our historians
have so construed it.

Dunstan's flight to Flanders must have followed early in the year
956 ; the charters of Edwy which are attested by him J may some of
them be referred possibly to the day of the coronation. Edgar
continued much longer at his brother's side, at least until the
summer of 957.3 The rebellion of the Northumbrians and Mercians
cannot be thrown later than the spring of 958. In that year Edgar
begins to issue charters as king.4 The revolt is placed by Florence
of Worcester in 957, and as bishop Kynewald of Worcester, whose
death made room for Dunstan as bishop, disappears in that year
from the charters, the recall of Dunstan probably followed immediately
on the revolt. Edgar is reckoned to have reigned two years at the
time of his brother's death.

Dunstan's return was followed by his promotion to the episcopate.
Glastonbury was in the hands of Edwy, and for the time it appeared
that he had no chance of recovering it. It was accordingly deter-
mined, in a council of the witan attached to Edgar, that Dunstan

1 On this subject may be read with
advantage Mr. Allen's Essay, appended
to his work on the Prerogative, p. 220,
and Hallam's note in the History of
the Middle Ages. The former is very
speculative. Hallam's conclusion is
in defiance of his argument.

1 These are, a grant to Wilton,
dated 955, Kemble, 436; one to
Abingdon, dated 956, Kemble, 441;
one dated 95G at Cirencester, in favour
of Worcester, Kemble, 451 ; one to
J21ric, in the Abingdon Cartulary,
dated 956, Kemble, 1186, 1187.

1 Edgar attests charters of his
brother as late as May 9, 957, Kemble,
465. A charter to bishop Oskytel,

which is attested by him, dated 958
(Kemble, 472), is shown by the indie-
tion to belong to 956.

4 These of course are not numerous :
one from the Peterborough Cartulary,
dated 958, in which Edgar calls him-
self 'rex Anglorum,' is signed by
Oskytel of Dorchester, Dunstan of
Worcester, Kinsige of Lichfield, Athulf
of Hereford, and Leofwine of Lindsey,
Kemble, 471 ; another, dated 959,
from the same Cartulary, has the
signature of Dunstan as bishop of
London, and Oskytel as archbishop of
York (Kemble, 480), Edgar calling
himself king of the Mercians.

MEMORIALS OF S. DUNSTAN 13

should be made a bishop. This council was held at a place called in council of
the various MSS. of the first life Bradanford or Brandanford.1 If the Brandantor(J
latter reading be right, and it is the reading which Mabillon
recognised in the Arras MSS., and is clearly that of the Cottonian,
the place was probably Brentford, the earlier form of which, Bregent-
naford, was probably lost. If the other reading be the true one,
Bradford in Wiltshire would seem to be the place meant ; but if so,
then Edwy's kingdom must have been much more circumscribed
than we have any other reasons for supposing it to have been. The
Wiltshire Bradford must, I think, have been in Edwy's hands, and
the balance of probability is in favour of Brentford.

The story further reads as if the resolution of the witan merely The ques-
was that Dunstan should be promoted. No see is mentioned, per- Dunstaifs
haps no see was vacant. We are not told that Dunstan was consecration
consecrated upon this recommendation, and Adelard probably
records the truth when he describes him as consecrated by Odo to
the see of Worcester. Yet it is quite possible that he was conse-
crated as an unattached bishop, as the Saxon priest describes, to
attend personally on Edgar and give him the benefit of his counsel.
Such an appointment would not have been entirely out of keeping
with the system of diocesan episcopacy that had prevailed in Wessex,
where from the time of Ethelwulf there had been occasionally shire-
bishops with no fixed see. On this hypothesis might be explained The tradi-
the tradition preserved by Adelard that Odo consecrated Dunstan,
' titulo ecclesiae cui episcopus datus est conticito ' ; the idea that he
did so by divine instruction, that he might succeed him at
Canterbury, being an after-thought.

Whether or no this was the case, the death of Kynewald, bishop He is
of Worcester, gave the new bishop a see. Kynewald's name appears Worcester
for the last time in a charter of 957 ; and, in the few charters of
958 which were issued by Edgar during his brother's lifetime,
Dunstan appears as bishop. If the festival kept on the 21st of
October at Canterbury, as the ordination of S. Dunstan,2 com-
memorates his episcopal consecration, it must, I think, be referred to
the year 957. In 959 he received the see of London, and held it and of
together with Worcester until the settlement that followed Edwy's r
/ death. This arrangement may not improbably have been made either Reason for
because Odo was dead, or because Canterbury, where a new bishop

would have had to seek consecration, was in the hands of Edwy.

x

1 The account of this council given Sacr. i. 54 : « xii. Cal. Novembris,

by Wilkins, Concilia, i. 224, is an Cantuariae, ordinatio B. Dunstani

extract from archbishop Parker's An- archiepiscopi, cujus vita quam fuerit

tiquitates. pontificatu digna etiam divina revela-

2 From the Obituary or Martyro- tione innotuit.'
logy of Canterbury, Wharton, Angl.

14

MEMORIALS OF 8. DUNHTAN

Date of
Rdwy's

:<...r- ..-.

Question as
to the date
of Odo's
death

Succession
of Elfsige
and Byrht-
helm

Who

promoted

them?

Edwy's marriage must have taken place in 956, or early in 957 ;
the charter of Abingdon, attested by Elfgifu the king's wife, and
Ethelgifu the king's wife's mother, bearing also the attestation of
bishop Kynewald.1 It is not attested by Odo, who had no doubt
been offended with the marriage. Edwy's charters in which Odo'e
name appears in 957 may have been granted most probably before
that event : those of 958, after the forced reconciliation, following
the separation of Edwy and Elfgifu, which is placed by the Anglo-
Saxon Chronicle of Worcester 2 in that year.

The next point to be considered is one of the most complex in
our early annals, but it is also one on which our Saxon priest is
a primary authority : the circumstances that followed the death of
Odo, and the appointment of Dunstan as his successor. Our
author, who gives no dates, tells us that, on Odo's death, Elfsin
or Elfsige, bishop of Winchester, succeeded him ; that Elfsige on
his way to Rome crossed the Alps in deep snow, and caught
the cold which killed him. His companions returned. Byrhthelm,
the bishop of Dorset, was chosen in his place, and having
shown himself incompetent to enforce discipline was sent back
to his see by the king, who then with the advice of his witan
appointed Dunstan.3 We are not told who was king when Elfsige
and Byrhthelm were appointed ; the king who nominated Dunstan
was of course Edgar. There is thus nothing in the original story that
is fatal to the belief that Elfsige and Byrhthelm were the nominees
of Edwy, and the humiliation of the latter prelate a result of the

during the life of Kynewald, Dunstan's
predecessor.

1 Tiberius, B. 4, ' Her on thissum
geare Oda arcebiscop totwaemde
Eadwi cyning and ^Ifgyfe, forthaem
the hi waeron to gesybbe.' It is to be
remembered that this is all the evi-
dence we have on the subject except
the tradition prevalent a hundred and
fifty years after. The Saxon priest
says nothing about the completion of
the marriage, and the biographer of
Oswald gives a different story, making
Edwy an adulterer : ' sub uxore pro-
pria alteram adamavit quam et rapuit

. . . Antistes autem (Odo) . . .
equum ascendit et ad villain qua mulier
mansitabat pervenit, eamque rapuit
et de regno perduxit.1 (Nero, E. 1.
fo. 1.)

* The life of Oswuld (Nero, E. 1),
which is the original authority for the
insult offered by Elfsige to Dunstan,
is also silent as to the king who
appointed Elfsige.

1 Hist. Abend, i. 218 ; Kemble, C.
D. No. 1201. The charter is not
quite simple. Edwy bestows Ken-
nington on the priest Brihthelm, with
the date 956, and the attestation of
Odo, Edgar, Elfsige, Oswulf , Wulfsige,
Kynewold, and Daniel ; that is clearly
before the revolt of the north, and
probably before the marriage. After
this Brihthelm, now a bishop, ex-
changes the Kennington estate for
one at Crydanbridge with abbot
Ethelwold of Abingdon ; this exchange
being without date, and attested by
' .Klfgifu thses cininges wif, and
.Ethelgifu thees cyninges wifes
modur,' Elfsige, Oswulf, and Cocn-
wald, bishops. This exchange is
undated, but it must have taken place
some time after the grant. Brihthelm
had in the meanwhile become a
bishop, Odo and Edgar were away
from the court, and Elfgifu and her
mother supreme for the time. All
then that it proves is the fact of the
marriage, and that it took place

MEMORIALS OF S. DUNSTAN 15

changes that followed Edwy's death. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle,
except in its latest and most questionable edition, does not mention
either the death of Odo or the names of Elfsige and Byrhthelm ; and
Adelard also is silent on the whole transaction.

When, however, we come to the time of Osbern and Florence, we Later state-

. . M ments at

find an immediate difficulty. Osbern attributes the appointment of variance
Elfsige and Byrhthelm to Edgar : Florence of Worcester, perhaps
wavering in his own mind, places the election of Elfsige before, and
that of Byrhthelm after, the accession of Edgar to the whole king-
dom.1 William of Malmesbury follows Osbern in ascribing the
appointment of Elfsige to Edgar, and although in the Life of
Dunstan he adopts the same statements about Byrhthelm, does not
mention him among the archbishops in the Gesta Pontificum.
Eadmer, who might have been expected to be accurate, follows The later

' r writers

Osbern. Such an array of writers, who possessed, in the records of refer the
their churches, authorities which have not come down to us, might ofEifsige
be supposed to afford a conclusive comment on the original state-
ment, strong enough certainly to refute an argument founded on the
first reading of that statement.

Such, however, is the scantiness of all information added by Reaiscan-
these writers to the original stock preserved in the Chronicle, that evidence
we can scarcely give them credit for possessing or for using materials
that have not come down to us. We have recourse, therefore, to the
information which we may find in charters and kalendars, and in a
more precise examination of the chronology.

Edwy died on the 1st or 2nd of October 959. 2 Odo died on the what time
2nd of June ; 3 but in what year ? His name is found attached to between the
an Abingdon charter dated May 17, 959, which has no decisive mark ami that of °
of forgery.4 If he died in June 959, there is still time before the Edwy?
1st of October for Elfsige to go as far as the Alps, thirty-three days'
journey, for his companions to return home, and Byrhthelm to be
elected. And the existence of a charter of Edwy, dated 959, and
attested by Byrhthelm as ' Dorobernensis ecclesife episcopus,' may
be regarded as conclusively proving that he was appointed by that
king.5 On the other hand, such a succession of events is so rapid as
to be almost unprecedented. Elfsige would hardly have found the

1 Flor. Wig. A.D. 958, 959. Abingdon charter, attested not only

2 Four MSS. of the Chronicle give by Odo but by Eadgiva the king's
the year 959 ; two 958 ; one Oct. 1, grandmother, Hist. Abend, i. 169-
958. Florence gives 959 ; the Kalen- 172. It is worth observing that of the
dar printed by Hampson gives the two copies of this charter one (Clau-
day Oct. 2 ; the charters afford ample dius, c. 9) omits the name of Odo.
proof that Edwy was alive in 959. * This charter, which is not in

3 Obituary of Canterbury, Angl. Kemble, is in the Book of Hyde (eel.
Sacr. i. 54. Edwards), p. 177.

4 Kemble, Cod. Dipl. No. 1224, an

16

MEMORIALS OP 8. DUNSTAN

Ododi i
probably

What was

Byrhthelm's

see?

Wells or
Sherborne,
or both

If ore than
one of the
name

Dnnstan

h.-'Ti;;;. -

archbishop

Alps so blocked with snow in June that he should he really frozen
to death ; and Florence of Worcester distinctly places Odo's death
in the year in which he separated Edwy and Elfgifu, that is in 958.
It is important, too, to observe that one copy of the Abingdon
charter omits the name of Odo. On the whole wo may safely con-
clude that sufficient ground is found for setting aside the statements
of Osbern as to the nomination of his two successors, and for inter-
preting the Saxon priest accordingly.

A minor question is this : Byrhthelm is called by our first
author the bishop of Dorset, that is, of Sherborne ; but the lists of
the bishops of Sherborne contain no such name, that see having
been occupied successively by Wulfsige, who, as we know from
charters, disappears in 958, and Elf wold, who signs first in 961. It
is true that between these years there is room for Byrhthelm, but
the lists, which are nearly contemporary, do not admit him. On
the other hand, we find prelates of this name at this period, in the
sees of Wells, Winchester, and London. It is not by any means
impossible that the bishop who was elected to Canterbury was the
bishop of Wells, who is called electus in 956, 1 and who may either
have held Sherborne after Wulfsige's death in 958, as well as Wells,
just as Dunstan held London, or have been called bishop of Dorset
in mistake for Somerset. We find his name, however, so often in
the Abingdon charters that it seems more natural to adopt the
former supposition. The fact that we find two bishops of the name
constantly attesting together2 hinders us from identifying this
Byrhthelm with the occupants of the sees of London and Win-
chester ; but it is obvious that if Canterbury were practically vacant,
as we have supposed, from June 958 to October 959, any bishops
appointed in the meantime must have either sought consecration
elsewhere or have held sees in plurality. I think that on the whole
it is most likely that Byrhthelm, who is called the king's kinsman, s
was a competitor with Dunstan in more ways than one ; he was
probably Edwy's prime minister, as Dunstan was Edgar's, and
Edgar's triumph was the decisive cause for his final defeat.

Dunstan then became archbishop of Canterbury in 959 ; the
entries in the Chronicle which place this event in 961 4 being

1 Kemble, C. D. No. 849 : from a
Bath Cartulary. Byrhthelm of Wells
succeeded a bishop named Wulfhelm
in 956 : Wulfsige of Sherborne dis-
appears from the charters in 958; and
his successor Elf wold first appears in
961. I am strengthened in this con-
jecture by finding that Mr. Robertson,
Hist. Essays, p. 194, note, also sup-
poses Byrhthelm to have succeeded

Wulfsige in 958.

« E.g., Kemble, C. D. No. 1225.

» Kemble, C. D. 469.

4 See Thorpe's edition, pp. 218,
219, where it will be seen that the
passage is an interpolation in one MS.,
is altogether omitted in four, and at
home only in the Canterbury MS.
Dom. A. 8, which is the least valuable
as an authority.

MEMOKIALS OF S. DUNSTAN 17

late insertions, and at variance with the evidence of charters. The
commemoration of his ordination on October 21,1 before mentioned,
may possibly refer to his installation at Canterbury ; and if this be
the case, no time could have been lost after Edwy's death in remov-
ing Byrhthelm, a fact which is moreover proved by two charters of
959 2 which Dunstan witnesses. After the settlement of the king- goes to
dom he went to Eome for the pall. This he received from Pope
John XII. probably in 960, in which year very few charters con-
tain his name. In 961 he consecrated Elfstan and Oswald his
successors in the sees of London and Worcester, probably also the
new bishop of Sherborne. In 963 he consecrated Ethelwold, his
old fellow-pupil or disciple, to the see of Winchester,3 and from
that date begins the struggle of the monks and clerks which struggle
furnishes most of the historians of the reign with their chief nfonk^an
subject of discussion. We must, however, dismiss this famous
question with a very few remarks in addition to those already
made.

All evidence seems to show that, whilst the monastic move- £iseof

the new

ment had taken its rise at Winchester, it had been received with the
most fervour in Mercia. Dunstan received his impressions in its
favour from Elfege the Bald. Ethelwold was a native of Winchester,
and Oswald had been trained and held preferment in the same city.
The revival of Glastonbury and Abingdon, under the patronage of
Edred, was the limit of success in Wessex for a long time, and the
four years of Edwy's rule were unfavourable to its extension. The
statements of Osbern and Eadmer, that Edwy confiscated all
monastic property, are not borne out by the authority of the earlier
writers, but Glastonbury had certainly been seized, and the con-
dition of Winchester under Ethelwold seems to show that such
monachism as had existed under Elfege was extinguished under
his successor. We may safely infer that the monastic party shared
in the disgrace of Dunstan, and was made to bear the effects of the
quarrel between Edwy and Odo. Accordingly, when the revolt of Connexion
the Mercians and Northumbrians placed Edgar in the position of a monastic
rival, and a too powerful rival, to his brother, it was natural that Jto-cia"
he should find support in the monastic party ; it is also quite
possible that that revolt was prompted by the leaders of the religious
reform, who were provoked by Edwy's foolish and unlawful mar-
riage. The story that Edgar in his early youth had been moved by
the sight of the ruined monasteries to make a vow of restitution 4

1 Ang. Sac. i. 54. ' Clericos perosos habuit, nostri habitus

* Kemble, C. D. Nos. 1221, 1225. viros sicut diximus honoravit," says
Chr. S. A.D. 963. the monk of Ramsey. (V. Oswaldi,

* Regularis Concordia : preface. Nero E. 1. f. 8.)

18

MEMORIALS OF S. DUNSTAN

Edgar's

monastic

zeal

Monachism
in Mercia

Importance
of the
rrvivn]

Process of
recovering
monastic

estates

may very well be true ; he owed his crown to men who were sincere
in their desire to bring about the same end. Unquestionably there
were many other points at issue. Wessex and Mercia were held
together by a very slight thread, as both earlier and later history
show ; but there can, I think, be no doubt either that religious
questions entered into the struggle, or that the results bound Edgar,
even more firmly than they bound Dunstan, to the monastic interest.
The very scanty notices of the Chronicle during Edgar's reign
illustrate this, and what little truth can be sifted from the exag-
gerations of the later monastic writers seems to confirm the conclu-
sion. Oswald, under the protection of the East Anglian ealdorman
Ethelwin, was working at Ramsey. Ethelwold was nursing a scheme
of extension which was to revive the churches which had perished
in the Danelaw. Archbishop Oskytel of York, the near kinsman of
Oswald and Odo, and of the half mythic Thurkytel, abbot of Bed-
ford, whom Crowland afterwards claimed as founder, must have
been one leader of the ' populus brumalis,' when they renounced
Edwy. Edgar's success placed these men in possession of all the
power they could desire. With Dunstan at Canterbury, Ethelwold
at Winchester, and Oswald at Worcester, their course was clear.
Ethelwold was the moving spirit, Oswald tempered zeal with dis-
cretion, Dunstan's hand may be credited with such little moderation
and practical wisdom as can be traced. The movement, with all its
drawbacks, was justifiable, perhaps absolutely necessary. The
cleansing of Winchester from the ' spurcitiae clericorum ' may not
have been indispensable to the welfare of Ramsey, Ely, Peterborough,
and Thorney ; but we cannot doubt that a monastic mission system
was necessary for the recovery of middle England from the desola-
tion and darkness which had been brought upon it by the Danes, or
that the monastic revival was in those regions both successful and
useful.

In his first year, 964, Ethelwold, with Edgar's assistance,
expelled the seculars from the two great monasteries of Winchester,
from Chertsey, and from Milton,1 and, after doing so, carried out his
scheme in middle England. He recovered Ely, Peterborough, and
Thorney from the hands into which they had fallen, and established
a body of monks in each, under abbots of his own training. Oswald
acted with less energy ; instead of driving the clerks out of his
cathedral at Worcester, he removed his episcopal chair to the
neighbouring monastery ; but he carried on his educational and
missionary work at Ramsey with not less zeal than was shown by
Ethelwold. It is accordingly on this part of England that the storm
falls when the old causes of quarrel revive after the death of Edgar.
1 Chr. 8. A.D. 964.

MEMORIALS OF S. DUNSTAN

19

The only other question of interest in the career of Dunstan
during the reign of Edgar is that which concerns the king's
coronation at Bath, and, in connexion with it, the story of the
nun of Wilton and the septennial penance. According to Osbern,
Edgar violated a nun at Wilton, who became mother of Edward,
his successor, and Dunstan imposed as a penance, besides other
observances, the disuse of the crown for seven years and the founda-
tion of a nunnery at Shaftesbury. Eadmer denies that the young
woman in question was a nun, or that she was the mother of Edward,
but admits the fact of the crime and the penance, with the exception
of the foundation of Shaftesbury, which was known to have been a
work of King Alfred. Gotselin, the biographer of S. Edith, and a
contemporary of Osbern, gives to the lady of Wilton the name of
Wulftrudis, and asserts that Edgar would have married her had she
not retired to take the veil at Wilton.1 Nicolas of Worcester,
Eadmer's friend, denied the connexion between the disuse of the
crown and the sin of Edgar, and gave the name of S. Edward's
mother as .-Ethelfleda, daughter of Ordmaer, ealdorman of the East
Angles.2 William of Malmesbury, in the Gesta Begum, whilst he
related three legendary stories of Edgar's vices, attempted to
harmonise the several accounts which he had read, and gave the full
account of the murder of Ethelwold and marriage of Edgar and
Elfthritha, adding that the nunnery of Werewell was founded as an
expiation for the crime.3

So far as direct evidence goes, the story of the nun of Wilton
rests on the testimony of Osbern, which is in itself suspicious, and
is told with circumstances that supply a partial refutation. As on
this the truth of the septennial penance depends, it may fairly be
argued that the whole story stands or falls together. The life of
S. Edith, however, which represents a quite independent tradition,
clearly shows that there was an ancient scandal about a veiled lady
at Wilton ; William of Malmesbury's legend of the murder of
Ethelwold proves a tradition as to the foundation of an expiatory
monastery. The words of the Anglo-Saxon poet, imbedded in the
Chronicle, are a telling proof of Edgar's vices.4 The coronation
taking place in 973, just seven years after the marriage of Edgar

1 Mabillon, AA. SS. O. S. B. sac. v.
p. 623.

- The biographer of Oswald (Nero
E. 1) says that Elfthritha was the
daughter of Ordmer, ealdorman of the
' Occidentales Angli ; ' but he also
makes her mother of both Edward
and Ethelred ; so that he must
have confounded two of Edgar's
wives. The Chronicle says that

Story of the
nun of
Wilton and
the seven
years'
penance

Certainty
that there
was an
ancient
scandal
about Edgar

Elfthritha was daughter of Ordgar.

3 Gesta Eegum, lib. I. (ed. Hardy,
p. 254).

4 A.I). 958. Canute thought Edgar
' vitiis deditus, maximeque libidinis
servus in subjectos propior tyranno
fuisset.' W. Malm. G. P. (ed. Hamil-
ton), p. 190 : from Gotselin's Life of
S. Edith ; Mabillon, sa3C. v. p. (526.

c2

20

MEMORIALS OF S. DUNSTAN

Of an v
certain
inference

Scantiness
of details
from 965
to 973

Death of
Edgar

No authen-
tic history of
Dunstan'g
later years

and Elf thritba, aflfords a presumption as to some connexion between
the story of the seven years' penance and that ill-omened marriage.
But the very circumstances which seem to us to afford a practical
clue to the explanation may have themselves suggested the legend.
It may be quite as wise to reject the whole of the legendary matter,
and deny, with Nicolas of Worcester, the connexion of the coronation
with the penance.1 If this be done, we cannot do better than accept
the theory which has been recently worked out with great research
and ingenuity by one of our most eminent historical scholars,2 that
Edgar's coronation at Bath was a solemn typical enunciation of the
consummation of English unity, an inauguration of the king of all
the nations of England, celebrated by the two archbishops, possibly
with special instructions or recognition from Rome, possibly in
imitation of the imperial consecration of Edgar's kinsmen, the first
and second Otto, possibly as a declaration of the imperial character
of the English crown itself.

The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle supplies only three facts during the
seven years that intervene between the marriage and the coronation :
the war in Westmoreland, the ravaging of Thanet by the king, of
which no explanation is given, and the appointment of Oswald to
the see of York. Florence of Worcester throws into these vacant
years the several stages of monastic progress : the year 967 is marked
by the foundation of Romsey ; in 968 Edgar placed monks at Exeter ;
in 969 the clerks were banished from the monasteries of Mercia ; in
970 3 the relics of S. Swithun at Winchester were translated ; and
in 972 the new minster was dedicated. The great coronation at
Bath took place at Whitsuntide 978, and the homage of the eight
kings shortly after at Chester. Two years after, on July 8, 975,
Edgar died, and was buried by Dunstan by his father's side at
Glastonbury.

Dunstan survived his friend for thirteen years, during which the
biographers do not supply a single item of independent information.
The Saxon priest tells us little of the reign of Edgar, and does not

1 The Life of Oswald, which gives
a fall detail of this coronation, has
not a word about the penance, and
represents as ' de more soli to.' How-
ever, as it gives at length the Promis-
sio Regis, as taken on the occasion, it
is clear that it was not a mere crown -
wearing festival.

1 Robertson, Hist. Essays, pp. 203-
215, a most learned and instructive
essay.

1 This translation must be dis-
tinguished from the more famous de-
dication of the church celebrated by

Wulfstan in the poem published by
Mabillon, sseo. v. pp. 614 sq., at which
Dunstan was present, and the bishops
Elfstan, Ethelgar, Elfstan, Escwig,
Elfege, JEthelsige, and Athulf : —

' Quorum summus erat vultu ma-

turus et actu

Canitie niveus Dunstan et an-
gelicus.'

The names of the bishops fix the date,
I think, to the year 980, in which
Ethelgar was consecrated ; Elfstan of
Ramsbury died in 981.

MEMOEIALS OF S. DUNSTAN 21

even mention his successors. Adelard records that the saint crowned
and anointed both Edward and Ethelred, and that he possessed
sufficient influence with the latter to induce him to appoint Elfege
to Winchester. The Chronicle does little more than record the
reversal of Edgar's monastic policy under his youthful successor by
the agency of Elf here, ealdorman of Mercia. Florence adds that Howsup
the influence of Elf here was counteracted by the three East Anglian ?ater au-
and East Saxon nobles, Ethelwin, Elfwold, and Brihtnoth, and gives thorities
an account of the election of Edward which bears a somewhat
suspicious likeness to the language of Osbern. It is to the Chronicle
that we owe our knowledge of the council of Kirtlington in 977,
and that of Calne in 978, the history of which was interwoven by
Osbern into his account of the monastic quarrel. The murder of
the young king is there recorded without the mention of the names
of the guilty. It is in Osbern that we first find it laid to the charge
of Elfthritha. But the Chronicler, who records under the year 980
the translation of Edward's body from Wareham to Shaftesbury, by
Elfhere and Dunstan, the former the leader of the secular, the latter
the patron of the monastic party, shuts out the probability that
Edward was sacrificed to political rather than personal aims. The

inference drawn from the silence of the contemporary chronicles is contrived
unfavourable to Elfthritha ; the statement that Edward's kinsmen

would not avenge him l does not warrant us in supposing that he
was the victim of a conspiracy. Dunstan crowned his successor at
Kingston, and then attempted to impress upon him the binding
character of his royal obligations in a document, the 'Promissio
Kegis,' with its commentary, which is still preserved. We may ask,
but we cannot answer, who guided the state during the childhood
of Ethelred. The political history of Dunstan ends with his acces-
sion.

It is, however, to this period of his life that the letter of Abbo Mea of
belongs, and the picture of his daily occupations drawn by the iifeini
Saxon priest. His chief employment was on the divine service, °
prayer and psalmody, and holy vigils ; now and then he resumed
the employments of his youth, exercising his old skill in handicraft
in the making of musical instruments like the organs which were
kept at Malmesbury, or the bells that were known at Canterbury as
his own work ; the early hours of the morning he gave to the very
needful task of correcting the faulty manuscripts of the library.
Even after he had retired from political life, leaving Ethelred to
mismanage his kingdom as he chose, the great domains of his
church afforded him abundance of public work ; it was his delight
to make peace between man and man, to receive and assist the
1 Chron. Sax. A.D. 975.

22

MEMORIALS OF S. DUNSTAN

Picture of
Duns tan's
old age

Probable
truth of the
sketch

His early

beatification

Dunstan's
•hare in
Edgar's

widows and fatherless, pilgrims and strangers of all sorts ; as an
ecclesiastical judge he never stayed his hand against unlawful
marriages, or in the maintenance of ecclesiastical order. He was
an admirable steward of the church's wealth, a founder and endower
of new churches, and indefatigable in the work of instruction,
gathering young and old, men and women, clerk, monk, and lay, to
listen to his teaching. ' And thus all this English land was filled
with his holy doctrine, shining before God and men like the sun and
moon. When he was minded to pay to Christ the Lord the due
hours of service, and the celebrations of the mass, with such entire-
ness of devotion he laboured in singing that he seemed to be speaking
face to face with the Lord, even if just before he had been vexed
with the quarrels of the people ; like S. Martin, he constantly kept
eye and hand intent on heaven, never letting his spirit rest from
prayer.'

The idea of the sketch is that of a good and faithful servant ;
there is nothing grotesque about the man as he appears in the pages
of the eye-witness ; nothing of the tyrannical ascetic. It is the
crowning of a laborious life, of a man who has had great power and
has used it for his country, and who, now that other rulers have
arisen who do not know or love him, falls back on the studies of his
youth, and spends his last years in the promotion of pious and
learned works. The end, if we set aside, as I think we may safely
do, the strange story of the miracle, is quiet and peaceful. He was
only sixty-four when he died, but his public life had begun early and
lasted long, and his fame lived both at home and abroad, in the
praises of the strangers whom he had befriended, the churches that
he had planted, the scholars whom he had taught, but chiefly in the
longing remembrance of the peace and glory which Edgar under his
teaching had maintained : the peace and glory which were written
in the hearts of the English, although they left vacant pages in the
chronicles, and which were the last glimpses of national prosperity.
Yet Dunstan's memory was worshipped not only from a feeling of
regret ; as I have remarked more than once, his beatification in
popular regard scarcely waited for his death ; and it is no small
proof of the estimation in which his memory was held that when, in
1017, Canute set the laws civil and ecclesiastical upon the ancient
and national footing, together with the feast on the anniversary of
S. Edward, a perpetual protest against the line of Ethelred, he
ordered the solemn and universal observance of S. Dunstan's mass
day.1

The true mark of Dunstan's mind must be looked for in Edgar's
legislation, and in the few canons passed at the ecclesiastical
1 Leges Canati (Schmid, p. 265), I. 17.

MEMORIALS OF S. DUNSTAN 23

assemblies of the reign. These will all be found among the ancient
laws and institutes of the Anglo-Saxons, published by Wilkins,
Thorpe, and Schmid.1 That Dunstan had a chief part in the
enactment of these is a necessary inference from the fact that
throughout the reign he was the king's closest friend and adviser,
the chief of his witan, the ecclesiastical head of the nation. The
laws that bear Edgar's name must bear the impress of Dunstan's
mind. We cannot follow the writers who argue that because
Edgar's canons do not forbid the marriage of the clergy they must
be referred to the period of his reign when Dunstan was not yet
archbishop, and argue, therefore, that they were the work of a king
of fifteen years old who was under the guidance of a party far more
monastically inclined than Dunstan himself.2

Of the secular laws of Edgar, the institution of the Hundred
seems to be a reconstruction and development of the old German
Hundred system, for special purposes of police, from which no
inference can be drawn as to the policy of its author. The secular
ordinances and the ' Supplementum ' are in this respect more impor-
tant ; and the preamble to the first of these asserts a noble principle :
' I will that every man be worthy of folkright, as well poor as rich,
and that righteous dooms be judged to him.' The enactments that
follow are few but definite, and touch on the remedial jurisdiction
of the king, the regular holding of the popular courts, the general
system of ' borh ' or security for appearance in the gemots, and the
uniformity of coins and measures. In the Supplementum the hand
of Dunstan is distinctly traceable ; it is an enactment in the time of
pestilence, that the wrath of God may be turned from the people.
' I and the archbishop command,' says the king, ' that ye anger not
God ' by robbing him or his church. The practices of religion are
enjoined, the rights of the king and his thegns, the legal freedom of
the Danes, and their possession of their own laws, are secured ; the
points included in the earlier laws are repeated, and the observance
of the peace enforced by threats and promises. Although these few
ordinances bear but a slight proportion to the laws of Ethelred and
Canute, they are distinctly constructive : the administration of
justice, the equal rights of poor and rich, Dane and English, and
the careful maintenance of the ' frith ' by the hundred system, are

1 Thorpe (folio ed.) pp. 109-118. no punishments or hard censures on
Schmid, pp. 182-199. the married clergy, as they certainly

2 Johnson's Canons, ed. Baron, i. would if Dunstan had been at the
408, ' Though these laws and the first making of them.' Also, p. 412, ' these
set of canons following next after canons, which I place before Dunstan'a
them are ascribed to king Edgar, yet accession to the see of Canterbury, as
they have nothing of the spirit of containing no censure against the
Dunstan in them : I mean they inflict married clergy.'

24

MEMORIALS OF 8. DUNSTAN

cml law* of

the j. ru.i

Canons of

the re:..-!!
of IM,-ar

hand in
them

Penitential
canons

Tradition
preserved by
William of
Malmcsbury
touching the
drinking
custom

progressive measures of reform. If Dunstan's work is here, we havo
some justification of the praises of his biographers.

The ecclesiastical laws of the period are of the same constructive
and progressive stamp. Those few enactments which are included
among Edgar's laws touch chiefly on payments to the churches,
church scot, tithe, and Rome penny, and on the observance of
festivals and fasts. The canons which touch on spiritual matters
have a wider interest ; 1 but, like most canonical legislation, they
incorporate very much of earlier law. They fall into two classes ;
the first are called the sixty-seven canons of Edgar, many of which
are taken from the Karolingian capitularies, and which touch on
synods, the exercise of spiritual discipline, the abolition of the relics
of heathenism, the observance of Sundays, festivals, and fasts, the
decent and solemn celebration of the sacraments, and the guidance
of the lives of the clergy. One or two are characteristic, we may
think, of Dunstan : ' That no priest receive a scholar without the
leave of the other by whom he was formerly retained ; ' ' that
every priest do teach manual arts with diligence ; ' ' that no learned
priest reproach him that is less learned, but mend him if he know
how ; ' ' that no noble born priest despise one of less noble birth ; if
it be rightly considered, all men are of one origin.' The penitential
canons which are found in connexion with these are a compilation
of the period from the earlier penitential books of the church, and
contain nothing original. Nor do they contain anything that con-
nects them with the reign of Edgar or the pontificate of Dunstan.
It is in these only that any mention is found of clerical marriages :
1 If a mass priest or a monk or deacon had a lawful wife before he
was ordained, and dismisses her and takes orders, and then receives
her again by lying with her, let every one of them fast as for murder
and vehemently lament it ; ' — a very necessary safeguard in an age
in which it was so common to play fast and loose with sacred
obligations. But this canon, on which apparently depends the
charge of persecuting the married clergy made so commonly against
Dunstan, is an extract from penitentials of much earlier date, and
cannot with any certainty be assigned to him as its re-enactor.s

William of Malmesbury has preserved a tradition which serves to
present Dunstan in a light that can hardly offend popular reformers
of this day. He introduced the custom of inserting pegs in the

1 Thorpe, pp. 395 sq. Johnson, i.
pp. 412 sq.

* It is taken from the fourth book
of the Pseudo-Egbertine Penitential,
which again is from the Pseudo-
Theodore, which takes it from the
Poenitentiale Komanuni, published by

Halitgar of Cambray ; here it is taken
from the Penitential of Columbanua,
and the earlier writers. See Wasser-
schleben, Bussordnungen der A bend -
landische Kirche, p. 365. Thorpe
pp, 408, 378, 283.

MEMOEIALS OF S. DUNSTAN 25

drinking cups, that no man might run into excess without knowing
it.1 Human nature, which is so apt to mistake a limit for a law, a
maximum for a minimum, soon put the pegs to the opposite use,
and required legislation that forbade the custom 'of drinking to
pegs,' or, as we should say, ' allowing no heeltaps.'

The early and more trustworthy writers connect the memory of
Dunstan with no cruel or barbarous asceticism. The evidence of
the laws does, I think, confirm the testimony of the Lives. Dunstan Dunstan an
is a constructor, not a destroyer ; a consolidator, not a pedantic ratherthan
theorist ; a reformer, not an innovator ; a politician, not a bigot ; a an ascetlc
statesman, not a zealot. His merits as a scholar, an artist, a
musician, a cunning craftsman, are a part of the contemporary pic-
ture which ought not to be disregarded. His zeal for education is a
far more authentic trait than his zeal for celibacy. His vindication His zeal for
of the law of marriage can never be regarded as a blot by those who marriage
know anything of the state of society, especially in the royal houses
of his day ; or consider the strange way in which religion and
courtly adulation could be combined when the uncorrupted body of
a king like Edgar was believed to work miracles. Yet this has
scarcely been fairly recognised. Dunstan's zeal for the purity of
marriage is acknowledged as a matter of merit when it was exercised
against the corrupt papacy; yet because by the command of the
witan of the kingdom he draws a wanton boy of fifteen from the
dangerous society of a girl whom it was unlawful for him to marry,
we are told that ' a young king was persecuted and dethroned by the strange
insolence of monkery exciting a superstitious people against him.' 2 sentatPion
There must be a sacredness, it would seem, about the very sins of
kings.

It is strange that of a life so important and diversified as that of NO literary
Dunstan not a single literary monument survives ; not a single Dunstan0
letter that can with any possibility be attributed to him, although
several addressed to him are extant, and will be found in the Bolls
Series. Diligent in his ecclesiastical work, diligent in his political
work, diligent as a student and as a teacher, he has left, beyond a
few lines of writing, the endorsement of a charter, and the prayer
put into the mouth of a kneeling figure in an illumination, no
writings whatever.3

It is true that during the middle ages, when the study of alchemy The tract on
was rife, a tract bearing the name of Dunstan was circulated among
the initiated ; but it was no doubt assigned to him as to a celebrated

1 Ed. Hardy, p. 237. be in Dunstan's handwriting (Allen,

2 Hallam, Middle Ages, ii. 267. Prerogative, 223) is based on the

3 The statement that one of the merest conjecture.
MSS. of the Chronicle is supposed to

26

MEMORIALS OF S. DUNSTAN

TV IW :-
UrisCon-
cordia

The Oon-
oordla U not
Dunstan's

Commen-
tary on the
Benedictine
Rule, not

Duiistan'a

Books that
have be-
longed to

Duiistan

saint and philosopher, whose name might gain for it a circulation
that it could not demand upon its merits. This work, the
'Tractatus inaximi Domini Dunstani archiepiscopi Cantuariensis
vere philosophi de lapide philosophorum,' was printed at Cassel in
1649, in the ' Claris portae aurea ' of George Ripley. l It is also
found in a fifteenth century MS. in the Library of Corpus Christi
College, Oxford.2

Another book which has been attributed to Dunstan is the
' Regularis Concordia,' a body of rules for monks, which has been at
least twice printed : first by Beyner in the ' Apostolatus Benedicti-
norum,' and again in the preliminary matter of the ' New
Monasticon.' It is an interesting and valuable work, written very
shortly after the monastic revival, and so early received as authori-
tative that it was translated into Anglo-Saxon before the Norman
conquest. It cannot, however, be ascribed to Dunstan, who is
mentioned in it as 'egregius hujus patriaa archiepiscopus, praesago
afflatus spiritu,' although it is easy to see that it might, by a very
natural mistake, be regarded as his work. It has a considerable
historical value, giving an account of the way in which Edgar was
induced to promote the monastic revival, the missions from Fleury
and Ghent, and the council of Winchester, of which so much is said
in the lives of Dunstan by Osbern and Eadmer. It may con-
jecturally be referred to the abbot Elfric.

There is in the Royal Library, in the British Museum,3 a large
commentary on the Benedictine rule, written in the twelfth or
thirteenth century, and illustrated with a very fine full-page picture
of a bishop. This has been attributed with some confidence to
Dunstan, but the MS. contains nothing to justify such a statement ;
neither the Latin style nor the general arrangement of the book is
at first sight consistent with the assumption ; and if there be among
the minuter points of the work anything that suggests it, I have
been unable in a careful examination to discover it.

Of the other books with which the name of Dunstan, not as
author but as traditionary owner, is connected, the most important
is the well-known Bodleian MS. marked Auctarium F. iv. 82.4
This volume consists of a bundle of very ancient remains, the chief
of which are, a large part of the Liber Euticis Grammatici de

1 Clavis ports aurea, p. 240. See
Wright's Biographia Literaria, i. 462.

* No. 128. Coxe's Catalogue of
MSS., C.C.C. p. 47. It is a fifteenth
century MS., once the property of
Brian Twyne.

1 MS. Reg. 10 A. 13. See Wright,
Biogr. Lit. i. 461.

4 Described in Macray's Annals
of the Bodleian, p. 20 ; Hickes,
Thesaurus, i. p. 144, where the first
page is engraved ; and iii. p. 63 ; Vil
lemarque's Notices des principaux
MSS. des Anciens Bretons, Paris,
1856.

MEMORIALS OF S. DUNSTAN 27

discernendis Conjugationibus, a quantity of extracts from the The Bod-
Scriptures in Greek and Latin, Tables for calculating the Full witha*8'
Moon, a Paschal table reaching from A.D. 817 to 832, the first book Kt* of
of Ovid's Art of Love, a homily in Anglo-Saxon on the Invention of
the Cross, and several minor fragments or notes on measures and
numbers. Several of these pieces contain British glosses and
furnish some of the earliest written specimens of Welsh. On the
first leaf of the volume is a large drawing of our Saviour, holding in
his right hand a long rod or sceptre, and in his left a book, with a
monk kneeling at his feet. On the sceptre is inscribed the text, ' Et
virga recta est virga regni Tui ' ; on the book, ' Venite filii, audite
me, timorem Domini docebo vos ' : from the mouth of the monk
proceeds a scroll, and over his head is the couplet —

" Dunstanum memet clemens rogo, Christe, tuere
" Tenarias me non sinas sorbsisse procellas."

A later inscription-at the top of the page tells us that this is Dunstan's
work : ' Pictura et scriptura hujus paginte subtus visa est de propria
manu sancti Dunstani.' This drawing was engraved in Hickes's
Thesaurus, vol. i. p. 144, and in other later works. The manuscript
itself is described in a very early catalogue of the Library of
Glastonbury, now in the Library of Trinity College, Cambridge, and
is also mentioned by Leland as seen by him there, with the note that
the book had been Dunstan's.1 It is one of the most curious
volumes in existence, and would go further to prove the antiquity of
Glastonbury and its connexion with early British as well as Anglo-
Saxon history than all the forged charters even if they were genuine.

Another Glastonbury book in the Bodleian is among the Hatton TheHattpu
MSS., No. 30 ; a copy of S. Augustine on the Apocalypse, at the end
of which in large capitals is the inscription, ' Dunstan abbas hunc
libellum scribere jussit,' a note evidently made before Dunstan had
reached the rank of either archbishop or saint.2

The Hatton collection contains another book (No. 42) inscribed The Liber

' Saucti

on the back ' Liber Sancti Dunstani,' which has been already Dunstani
mentioned as the volume in which the head of ' Wulfric Gild ' is drawn.
This is a collection of canons ; the first portion written about the
time of Dunstan, the latter about a century earlier. The more
ancient part consists of the Apostolic canons, and decrees of councils
which form part of the early collections of decretals. The rest of the
volume comprises a copy of the great Irish collection of canons in
sixty-seven chapters, which is found in the much damaged Cotton
MS. Otho E, 13, in the S. Gall MS. 243, and in the Paris MSS. 3182

1 Leland, Collectanea, iii. 154.

- Also mentioned by Macray, Annals, p. 20.

28

MEMORIALS OF S. DUNSTAN

The

Sher borne
Pontifical
at Paris

DunsUn'ii
penmanship

and 12021, which was prepared for the press by the late Mr. Arthur
Had dan as a part of the second volume of the councils, and has just
been printed in Germany from a collation of various MS8. by Dr.
Wasserschleben of Giessen. The Hatton MS. furnishes a somewhat
enlarged edition, such as Dunstan might be supposed likely to make.
Besides this it contains the canons of Adamnan, a selection of
passages from the Roman and Frank law books, and a quantity of
regulations about degrees of kindred. The fact that it contains the
Irish canons adds a presumption that it was written at Glastonbury,
an inference we should be inclined at first sight to draw from the
company in which it is found. If it was really Dunstan's book, we
may see in it reflected the nature of his studies : the Irish canons he
might get from his teachers at Glastonbury ; the Frank and Roman
law during his exile at Ghent ; the regulations touching marriages
and the degrees of kindred would illustrate those peculiar points
which come out most strongly in the traditions of his discipline.

The National Library at Paris possesses what is called the Ponti-
fical of Dunstan, a magnificent folio of the tenth century, which
once belonged to the church of Sherborne in Dorsetshire, and
may not improbably have been given by Dunstan or one of his
early successors. Its number in the catalogue of Latin MSS.
is 948. It contains besides the Pontifical, on vacant leaves, a
number of interesting pieces touching English church history.
Amongst these is a list of the bishops of Sherborne, ending with
Ethelric, who became bishop in the year 1001 ; l the letter of Pope
John XII. to Dunstan ; the letter of an archbishop, whose name is
not given, to bishop Wulfsige, printed in the Rolls Series, and a list
of the books ' quos custodit Dodo ' ; perhaps the Sherborne Library.
This list, which may possibly have been printed, mentions amongst
other books, ' Liber Legis Salicae,' ' Liber Bernelini in Abaco,' and
' Liber Helprici artis calculatoriee.' Other articles in the volume
are an Anglo-Saxon sermon ' de dedicatione ecclesiae ' ; the order
for the benediction of an abbot, ' tempus inter hominis mortem et
ultimam resurrectionem ' ; and ' this is thaera geraednessa sum the
bisceopas geraed habbath.' Besides these there are some Sherborne
charters which have been printed by Kernble.

Of Dunstan's penmanship, besides the picture in the Bodleian
MS., there are possibly two or three specimens existing in charters.
The cathedral church of Christ at Canterbury possesses one, a grant

1 I give the list from this MS. :— Waerstan. 14. .Ethelbald. 15. Si-

I. Aldhelm. 2. Forthere. 3. Here- gelm. 16. Alfred. 17. Wulfsige.
wald. 4. .Ethelmod. 5. Denefrith. 18. Alfwold. 19. -Ethelsige. 20.
6. Wigberht. 7. Ealhstan. 8. Ealh- Wulfsige. 21. Ethelric. It agrees
round. 9. ^Ethelheah. 10. Wulfsige. exactly with MS. Tiberius B. 6. See

II. Asser. 12. ^Sthelwerd. 13. Registrum Sacr. Angl. p. 165.

MEMORIALS OF S. DUNSTAN 29

by king Edred dated in the year 949, in which he gives the monastery
of Beculver to the mother church. A duplicate of this exists among
the Cotton charters, and has been photographed by order of the
trustees of the British Museum. Dunstan professes himself to be the
writer : ' Ego Dunstan indignus abbas rege Eadredo imperante hanc
domino meo hereditariam kartulam dictitando conposui et propriis
digitorum articulis perscripsi.' l Another is said by Mr. Wright to
have been in the possession of the church of Winchester.2

Of Dunstan's musical ability it is possible that we have a trace The Kyri
in the trope or cantus ' Kyrie rex splendens,' which according to the dens
Salisbury use is appointed to be sung on his festival, after the officium.
The text of this composition will be found in the Bolls' volume,
p. 857, taken from the Gradual,3 collated with the printed editions of
the Missal. All, however, that can be said of it is that it may be
Dunstan's. The history of it is this. Eadmer relates a story of
Dunstan falling asleep one Sunday at mass, whilst waiting for Edgar,
who had gone out hunting. In his sleep he heard a solemn service
in heaven, and when he awoke dictated to his servants a ' Kyrie
Eleyson,' which he had learned there, which, according to the
biographer, was in his days sung in many places among the solemn
ceremonies of the mass.4 It would seem a natural conclusion that
the ' Kyrie rex splendens ' which was sung only on the feasts of
Dunstan and S. Michael should be identified with this ; and although
William of Malmesbury does not notice it except in a very cursory way, Dev!1^"i
it must have been believed soon after his day. Higden is, however, history
the first writer who distinctly states that the ' Kyrie ' which Dunstan
learned contained the ' modules harmonic ' which were contained
in the trope so famous among the English, ' Kyrie rex splendens.'
The statement is copied by Capgrave, and appears also in
Bromton, and possibly in other writers of the fifteenth century.5
If, however, we venture to assume thus much, it may reasonably
be questioned whether the words or the music only should be
attributed to Dunstan. Higden's language seems to refer to the
music, that of Eadmer to the words. It has indeed been thought
that as the peculiar tropes or variations on the ' Kyrie ' are not found
until the thirteenth century in the common missals, the music only
of this one could even by tradition be Dunstan's. But this is a
mistake, for we possess a tropary dating nearly if not quite from

1 Kemble, C. D. No. ccccxxv. conticescendum puto quod et Kyrie

2 Wright, Biog. Lit. i. 459. Eleyson eximium e superis auditum

3 In the Bodleian, among the agminibiis, quod nostrates satis dul-
' Gough Missals.' citer person :ire consuescunt.'

4 The Kyrie Eleyson story, ho\v- 5 Higden, ap. Gale, p. 270 ; Brom-
ever, occurs much earlier in the life of ton, ap. Twysden, c. 879.

Oswald, Nero E. 1, fo. 16 : ' Hoc non

80

MEMORIALS OF S. DUNSTAN

Question of
the trans-
lation of
Don stan's
bones

No reason to
believe the
story of
Duns tan's
translation

Parallel

traditions

Dunstan's days, which contains a large number of ' Kyries,' both words
and music. In this we do not find ' Eyrie rex splendens,' but several
forms of expression more or less coinciding with it.1 If we suppose
that Dunstan wrote the trope, it would not of course appear at once
in the service books, but there is nothing in it inconsistent with this
antiquity. It may have been many times remodelled like the other
' Kyries ' and rearranged afterwards.

In the later pages of the Rolls' volume much will be found about
the claim of the monks of Glastonbury, first asserted in the twelfth
century and stoutly maintained down to the age of the Reformation,
that they possessed the bones of Dunstan. They had been removed,
according to the story, in the reign of Edmund Ironside, and proved
their genuineness by working miracles. Into the details of this story
we need not enter : there is no reason whatever for believing that such
a translation ever took place, or that Glastonbury ever possessed a
single bone of Dunstan. The tale, like so many other marvels of
hagiology, has its parallels elsewhere : no doubt relics were stolen
on a large scale as well as given and purchased. King Edmund
was believed to have removed from the north to Glastonbury the
bones of Aidan, Ceolfrith, and Hilda ; 2 and these saints had special
commemorations at Glastonbury so early that the invention of the
story cannot fairly be ascribed to William of Malmesbury.3 Edred
and Odo again were believed to have carried off the body of 8.
Wilfrid from Ripon to Canterbury. These were cases in which the
bodies of the saints were removed to save them from the profane
hands of the Norsemen. A still closer parallel may be found in the
history of Ely. Ecgfrid, the abbot of S. Alban's, according to the
Ely historians, flying at the command of Stigand from the Normans,
carried with him to Ely the shrine containing the bones of the proto-
martyr, and, in order to obtain admission into the brotherhood,
deposited them or allowed them to be deposited with the bones of
S. Etheldreda.4 The S. Alban's historians denied the truth of this.
The flight of the abbot — Fretheric they call him — is admitted, and
his death and burial at Ely ; ' whence,' says Matthew Paris, ' they
of Ely, lying against their own heads, assert that he brought thither
with him the bones of S. Alban, not fearing to allege against the holy
man the crime of sacrilege.' The reverence paid to S. Alban was there-
fore diminished, as was the case also with other saints of the kingdom,

1 MS. Bodl. 775.

* W. Malmesb. Oegta Pontiff, p.
198.

* See especially the Kalendar in
MS. Cotton, Nero A. 2 ; and that in

the Missal of Leofric in the Bodleian
Library.

4 Liber Eliensis (ed. Stewart), p.
227.

MEMORIALS OF S. DUNSTAN 31

and miracles in their churches became less frequent.1 Before 1129 story at
another competitor, ' quoddam collegium inDacia,' falsely asserted the
possession of the relics, and in that year the coffin at S. Alban's was
opened and the bones counted. Still the men of Ely contended
that miracles constantly proved them in the right. At last, under
papal pressure, early in the reign of Henry II. they confessed that
they had been deceived by a pious fraud.2 Not so the monks of
Glastonbury, who carried on the battle until the eve of the Reform-
ation. There is no probability that Dunstan's remains ever left Can-
terbury ; they rested in the shrine which so many ages of pious
affection had provided and adorned until the Reformation, when, if
they escaped the blind profanity of Henry VIII., it was because the
glories of S. Dunstan had been eclipsed by a more famous ecclesi-
astical hero.3

Of the cultus of Dunstan the illustrations given in the eighth
section of this volume in the Rolls Series will probably prove sufficient
to content the reader.

I shall not attempt to draw a minute character of Dunstan, for Dunstan's
the materials before us afford too small data to make it possible
to do so with any definiteness. But I think we may, from the
language of the first biographer, the letters of Abbo and the other
writers included in this volume, get a glimpse of the man, truer if
fainter than the fancy portraits drawn by later writers who have
seen no mean between indiscriminate adulation on the one hand and
the most hateful detraction on the other. Dunstan has been repre- Misrepre-
sented by a very learned recent writer as a man whose whole life was
'a crusade, cruel, unrelenting, yet but partially successful, against
the married clergy, which in truth comprehended the whole secular
clergy of the Anglo-Saxon kingdom.' ' Dunstan was, as it were, in
a narrower sphere, a prophetic type and harbinger of Hildebrand.
Like Hildebrand, or rather like Damiani doing the work of Hildebrand,
in the spirit not of a rival sovereign but of an iron-hearted monk, he
trampled the royal power under his feet. The scene at the coronation
of king Edwy, excepting the horrible cruelties to which it was the
prelude, and which belong to a more barbarous race, might seem to
prepare mankind for the humiliation of the emperor Henry at Canosa.'4
For this invective there is not in the writings of contemporaries, or
in any authentic remains of Dunstan's legislation, the shadow of a

1 Gesta Abbatum (ed. Biley), i. 51. and at Glastonbury, crosses, chasubles,

2 Ibid. p. 176. censers, and vestments of his making.

3 In the twelfth and thirteenth Wright, Biogr. Lit. i. 435, 459.
centuries the great bells which he had 4 Milman, Latin Christianity, vol.
made for Abingdon were preserved ; iv. p. 25 (ed. 1867).

82 MEMORIALS OF 8. DUN8TAN

foundation. What Dunstan did at Edwy's coronation he did by the
order of the assembled witan of the kingdom. The cruelties which are
said to have followed are asserted on the authority of Osbern and
Eadmer, the earlier of whom wrote nearly a century and a half after
the death of Edwy, and depend on no other testimony. If they ever
took place at all, they took place during Dunstan's exile, during the
war that preceded the election of Edgar. Such at least is the state-
ment of Osbern, who is the sole witness ; Eadmer's additions in his
life of Odo resting on no evidence at all.1 The charge of persecuting
the married clergy is as baseless. We have no means of judging
what proportion of the secular clergy was married : the secular clerks
who held monastic property were married, and the same evidence
which proves their marriages proves also how lightly the marriage
**e as^ uPon them. But against these it was not Dunstan chiefly,
sun's hawh- but Oswald and Ethelwold who took the measures of reform which

ness towards

the married are represented as persecution, and which were no doubt severe and
undiscriminating. In this Dunstan, as I have already remarked,
takes only a secondary part : he does not remove the clerks from his
own cathedral churches ; his sympathy with the monastic movement
is only to be gathered by inference from the fact that he did not
oppose it. As to the married clergy in general there is absolutely
no evidence whatever ; and here is the most astounding amount of
assumption. It is scarcely to be believed that our canonists, in
discussing the date of the little ecclesiastical legislation that belongs
to Edgar's reign, have determined that it does not belong to Dunstan's
pontificate because it contains no enactments against the married
clergy. Yet Dunstan became archbishop as soon as Edwy was dead,
and beyond a doubt inspired whatever ecclesiastical law was made
SJf006 3 in that reign. In fact the only laws which can with any probability
legislation be ascribed to Dunstan are altogether silent on the point. We know
that when he was a young man in minor orders he intended to marry,
and it was the taking of monastic vows that showed his renunciation
of the design. It is the enforcement of monastic discipline, not the
compulsory celibacy of the clergy, that is the object of the clerical
reforms ; and in this Dunstan only partly sympathised. As for the
charge of trampling on the royal authority, it may be dismissed in a
word. Men's views of what constitutes vice may differ, but any rule
that condemns Dunstan condemns John the Baptist also ; and if any
error on the side of severity is pardonable, it is when the rebuke is

I will content myself with a little can be added to the exhaustive

general reference to Mr. Robertson's summary of the former writer. Both

invaluable essay on Dunstan's policy, works stand, as might be expected, in

Hist. Essays, pp 189 sq. : and to Dr. strong contrast with Milman, Hallam,

Hook's Life of Dunstan. I think and Lingard.

MEMORIALS OF S. DUNSTAN 83

addressed to the vices of princes : why is Dunstan to be blamed for
that which is the glory of Ambrose and Anselm ?

But in truth the career of Dunstan was no anticipation of that K° likeness
of Hildebrand : it was the very counterpart of that of Gerbert, the Dunstan and
student, the practical workman, the wise instructor of a royal pupil,
the statesman, the reformer, and the patriot. Osbern and Eadmer
drew the character of their saint in the spirit with which they were
themselves inspired, imputing to him qualities which in their
imagination were virtues, as in the eyes of more modern writers they
have seemed to be vices, but which the world may be almost said to
have learned from the life of Gregory VII. They drew the picture
of the saint in lines and colours that seemed to them indispensable
to sanctity, and read the history of Dunstan through the history of
Henry IV.

Another point has been already referred to, which receives some connexion
important illustration from the early lives and letters here printed : vith'fian-
the connexion of England with Flanders, especially in the point of d
monastic reform. It must not be forgotten, that while monasticism
had become under Alfred practically extinct in England, on the
continent it had merely languished. The monasticism of Flanders
was active and energetic compared with that of England, just as the
monasticism of Fleury was definite and severe as compared with
that of Flanders. Count Baldwin had married the daughter of
Alfred ; she took a part in the monastic revival in her adopted
country, such as Alfred had attempted at home, and which was carried
out by two men of very different character in the two countries,
Edred and Arnulf, both grandsons of Alfred. In the year 918 the
monks of Blandinium had received from Etheldritha, or Elstrudis as
they called her, a grant of lands in Kent which were in their hands
when the Domesday Survey was made.1 Whilst Edred was reviving Revival of
Glastonbury and Abingdon, Arnulf was rebuilding and refilling
S. Bertin, S. Vedast, and Blandinium. Eighteen great monasteries
were restored by him. All this was well known to the West Saxon
princes. Elstrudis was buried at Blandinium. Edwin, the brother
of Athelstan, who perished at sea by his brother's cruelty, it was
said, found his resting-place at S. Bertin.2 The so-called monks
who were expelled in the process of reform and would not accept the
revived Benedictine rule, found refuge with Athelstan in England.3

1 Meyer, Annales Eerum Belgica- Anglia in finibus Cantii, unde tabulas

rum, p. 20. ' A.D. 929. Obiit Elstru- habent anno 918.' A charter con-

dis magni principis mater 7mo kalen- firming the grant of Etheldritha,

das Junias, jacetque sepulta prope made by Edward the Confessor, is

maritum Blandinii in sedicula parentis printed in Kemble, C. D. No. dcclxxi.
virginis. Hsec Blandiniensibus cceno- 2 Meyer, p. 20.

bitis amplas donavit possessiones in 3 Ibid. p. 21.

D

34

MEMORIALS OF S. DUNSTAN

Continental
relations of
the West
Saxon Kings

Intercourse
of England
with the
continent

Greek words
in the Latin
of the time

It is thus easy to account for the hospitable treatment which
Dunstan found in the territories of Arnulf, and for the letters
addressed to Edgar, to Dunstan and his successors, by the Flemish
and North French monasteries, asking or returning thanks for help.

This serves to open a comparatively untrodden field of ecclesi-
astical history, for the illustration of which it is probable that
more remains are extant than is generally suspected. It is extremely
desirable that the history of the foreign relations of England,
political, ecclesiastical and literary, in the tenth and eleventh cen-
turies, should be more carefully explored. There is no reason to
suppose that the invasion of the Danes, when they destroyed so
much else, really interrupted the intercourse of England with
Germany. The marriages of the daughters of Alfred and Edward
do not stand alone. The political negotiations of Odo placed Lewis
d'Outremer on the throne of the West Franks ; the wanderings of
Kynewald brought Athelstan and his court into close ecclesiastical
affinity with the monasteries of Germany. It is true that there is
some uniformity in the result : English gold is as ingenuously
asked for, and as freely bestowed, as it continues to be for ages after.
English manuscripts are borrowed, of which there is no notice of
return. Few and far between are the notices of Englishmen in
continental authors, but nevertheless there are traces of a continuous
and lively intercourse, which might be multiplied by close examina-
tion, and might yield an unexpected harvest to patient labour.

The number of Greek words that occur in the early lives and letters
will necessarily attract the notice of scholars. This is no peculiarity
of English writers ; it is a common feature of the period ; and it is
one the examination of which has never been thoroughly carried out.
The superficial use of glossaries, without any knowledge of grammar,
will account for some part of the vocabulary which so curiously
diversifies the Latin of the Saxon priest. The use of Greek hymns
or Greek versicles in the services of the church may account for a
phrase here and there. The occasional visit of a Greek pilgrim or
exile awoke from time to time the desire of knowing a few Greek
words, or the forms of the Greek letters. But the exact amount of
knowledge of Greek literature is not easy to calculate ; the few
references that occur seem to be stock quotations, drawn probably,
if not certainly, through the medium of the Latin Fathers. Pheno-
mena like John Scotus Erigena were rare indeed ; yet the age of
Dunstan almost reaches the age of John Scotus, and what was
possible for one scholar was not quite impossible for others. The
struggles of the Saxon emperors in Southern Italy probably did
something to bring spoken Greek to the ears of western ecclesiastics.

35

THE HISTOEICAL WOEKS OF MASTEE
EALPH DE DICETO, DEAN OF LONDON

[IN two volumes of the Rolls Series are contained ' the whole of the
historical matter which claims him as author or collector.' Ralph de
Diceto not only wrote many treatises, he also made compilations from
his own larger works. In the latter part of the Preface, which is not
printed in this volume, Bishop Stubbs gives an account of the several
MSS. which he used in editing Ralph's writings. In another place he
examines Ralph's value as a historian. The following account of Ralph's
life throws an interesting light upon the duties of an Archdeacon and
Dean in the twelfth century, upon the Becket dispute, and upon the eccle-
siastical greatness of London in the reigns of Henry II. and Richard L]

IN the roll of English Historians of the twelfth century no name Prominence
stands higher than that of Kalph de Diceto. He has been more Diceto, as a
fortunate than either Eoger of Hoveden or the author of the ' Gesta p
Eegis Henrici ' ; for the great ecclesiastical position which he
occupied for more than fifty years made him, modest and retiring as
he seems to have been, a definitely public man. As a public man,
he left traces of his presence in the record of public affairs, and these
traces furnish us with some important points of his personal bio-
graphy I propose, in the following pages, to attempt a sketch of
the career of the author, and to give an account of the external
history of the book now before us, reserving for the introduction to
the second volume what has to be said about the intrinsic value of
his labours, the sources of his information, and the relations of the
Imagines Historiarum to the other contemporary annals of the same
age.

The most obscure point, perhaps, in our author's personal |Jssc^mtyof
history is his name. It is peculiar to himself. History and record
alike give him the name of ' Radulfus de Diceto,' and the surname
he shares with no other. He almost invariably uses it in full, when-
ever he writes about himself ; he prefixes it at length to his literary
works ; he inserts it in the salutation of his letters ; he heads the
acts in which he and his chapter join with his full name ' Ralph de

86

THE HISTORICAL WORKS OF

Significance
of the
author's
name

Not a family
name

Is it a local
name?

Diceto the dean of the church of S. Paul at London, and the
chapter of the said church, to all to whom these presents shall
come, greeting ' ; and he dates his survey of the estates of his
church by this among other notes : ' per Radulfum de Diceto deca-
num Lundoniensem, anno primo sui decanatus.' It may be
thought that in the latter documents he used this form merely for
the purpose of distinguishing his own acts as dean from those of
his predecessor Ralph of Langford ; but the same peculiarity is
found whilst he is acting as archdeacon before he became dean ; and
it is carefully observed by his contemporaries : Gilbert Foliot, John
of Salisbury, William Fitz Stephen, Arnulf of Lisieux, distinguish
him as ' Radulfus Dicetensis ' or ' Radulfus de Diceto.' It would
almost seem that he prided himself for some reason on the surname
which he had assumed, or else that he held so humble an opinion
of his own importance that he though it requisite on every occasion
to distinguish himself from the more conspicuous persons who bore
the same Christian name. Illustrations of this practice will abound
as we proceed. Any conclusion, however, to which we may come
upon the point, must be regarded as showing that, at a period at
which surnames, whether patronymic, local or official, were becoming
much more common than they had been, Ralph de Diceto was one of
the very first to use such a name distinctively and invariably. It is
this peculiarity which enables us to detect his presence on occasions
and in documents in which, if he had been content to follow the
common practice, it would have been unnoticed.

The fact that no other person has been discovered who bore the
name of ' Diceto ' is a very strong argument against the hypothesis
that it is a patronymic or family name like Biset or Belet, Basset,
Foliot, or Lycett.1 If it be interpreted as denoting the birth-place
of the bearer, or some benefice which he held in early life, there
seems to be an insuperable difficulty in the identification. The word
might be a Latinised form of an English local name such as Dicet
or Disset ; but no place of such name is known to exist. Possibly it
may lurk still in some remote Shropshire or Essex manor, but it has
yet to be discovered. Ditcheat in Somersetshire might tempt us, in
its present form, to identify it with Dicetum, but in the days of
Ralph it was still Dichesyeat. It might also be a Latinised form of a
French Dicy, Dizy, or Dissai, and of such places there is no lack,
but there is nothing in Ralph's personal history to connect him
with them. Under such circumstances any lengthened speculation
would be simply a waste of ingenuity. As, however, the name is a
part of the history of the man, it demands some brief consideration.

1 Bishop Bancroft calls Ralph de Diceto Ralph Dycett; Statutes of S.
Paul's (ed. Simpson), p. 279.

MASTEK EALPH DE DICETO 87

The first and indeed the only positive claimant of the honour of ciaim of
giving name to our author is the town of Diss, in Norfolk. In this gMn'g n
case neither the antiquity of the claim nor the grounds upon which
it is based entitle it to more than the character of a guess. Diss
appears in Domesday Book in several places and invariably in the
form of ' Dice.' l Now, supposing the final ' e ' of Dice to have been
sounded, the Latin form Dicetum might be a probable translation
of Dic6 ; but no such form is known to occur. Diss is never, so far
as records have thrown light upon the point, Latinised as Dicetum.
It appears as ' Dize ' in the Pipe Eolls of Henry II.2 ; as ' Disze ' in
the Pipe Eolls of Eichard I.3 ; as ' Disce ' in the Patent Eolls of
John.4 It is ' Dysse ' in the Taxation of Pope Nicholas in 1291. 5
The records of the abbey of Bury S. Edmund's show that among the
inmates or officers of that house there were, contemporary with our
author, three at least who took their names from Diss. Jocelin of
Brakelond mentions Master William of Dice, who was master of the
schools : his son Walter, who was a candidate for the living of
Chevington ; and a monk named John : they are John, Walter, and
William ' de Dice ' and ' de Dicia.' 6 The list of the sacrists of S.
Edmund's, printed in the Monasticon, contains the name of ' Willel-
'mus de Disce,' who filled the office for four days in Abbot Samp-
son's time.7 The Eoyal Library, now in the British Museum,
contains a volume with the inscription ' Hunc librum scribi fecit
Willelmus de Dice, servus et monachus S. Edmundi, ad honorem
S. Edmundi.' 8 In a document appended to Jocelin's Chronicle,
William of Diss is called ' Willelmus de Dicia.' Dyssa is the form
used by Alexander III. These facts seem to show that without
further evidence the claim of Diss should not be allowed, and there
are circumstances which tend to show that Dicetum should be sought
elsewhere.

In the first place, the common practice of calling a beneficed
clergyman by the name of his parish may suggest that Ealph was son
the rector of Dicetum. But he was not rector of Diss. Uncertain as
are the number and situation of his several preferments, we know

1 Domesday, vol. ii. ff. 114, 129, 7 ' Waltero de Banham successit
149, 154, 176, 210, 215, 228, 263, 269, Willelmus de Disce, qui cum modo
272, 276, 278. electus fuisset ad illud officium, et in

2 Eot. Pip., Hen. II., ed. Hunter. illo a die Sancti Thomas martyris

3 Eot. Pip., 1 Eich., ed. Hunter, p. usque ad Circumcisionem Domini, per
39. quatuor videlicet dies stetisset, interim

4 Eot. Pat., ed. Hardy, i. 190. sompnum oculi sui capere non potue-

5 Taxatio P. Nicol., p. 84 b. runt ; qui videns se ibidem proficere

6 ' Walterus filius magistri Wil- non posse, suam ab abbate Sampsone
lelmi de Dice ; ' ' Johannes de Dice ; ' (A.D. 1182-1211) petiit cessionem.'
' Willelmus dictus de Dicia.' Joe. Mon. Angl. iii. 163.

Brakelond (Carnd. Soc.). pp. 32, 83, 8 Casley's Catalogue, p. 127.
84, 102.

88

THE HISTORICAL WORKS OF

Hereditary
parsons of
Diss.

Was Ralph
a native of
Diss?

Ralph shows
no special
connexion
with Diss or
its lords

that the church of Diss was held during his life by two persons
with whom he seems to have had no connexion. This is proved by
a document which so greatly struck the fancy of Bishop Bale that
he twice mentions it in different works, once in the ' Scriptores ' ' and
once in the ' Votaryes,' as showing that two persons, father and
son, were at this period successively parsons of Diss. He had seen
a decretal epistle of Pope Alexander III., addressed to John of Oxford
when bishop of Norwich, and written, therefore, between 1176, when
John of Oxford was consecrated, and 1181, when Alexander III.
died. In this letter the Pope ' commaundeth that Wyllyam the new
person of Dysse, for clayminge the benefyce by inheritaunce, after
the decease of his father person Wulkerell which begate him in his
presthode, should be dispossessed, no appellacyon admitted.' 2 The
letter itself has not been found, and is not among the collected
epistles of Alexander III., but Bale's authority on such a point is not
to be questioned. By the name Wulkerell we may take it for
granted that the common East Anglian Wulfketell is meant, and in
the story we have one of many instances of the tenure of ecclesias-
tical benefices in hereditary succession, a practice which the popes
found it extremely difficult to suppress, and which is the subject of
many extant letters of Alexander himself, preserved among Foliot's
epistles and in the appendix to the Acts of the Lateran Council of
1179. Wulfketell and William would leave no room for Ralph,
unless we suppose him very early in life to have held the benefice
and afterwards to have resigned it. Such a supposition, however, is
scarcely reconcilable with the fact that he clung so tenaciously to
the name.

In the second place, if Ralph had been, either by birth or prefer-
ment, connected with Diss, we might fairly expect that we should be
able to trace the connexion in his books ; we might expect to find
some minute particulars or some special words of respect or dis-
respect, touching the Lords of Diss, to whose patronage he might be
indebted, or whose acquaintance he must have made. The Lord of
Diss during great part of Ralph's life was Richard de Lucy, the
chief minister of Stephen and the great justiciar of Henry II.
Richard died the year before Ralph was promoted to the deanery of
S. Paul's, and was succeeded in his lordship by his son-in-law,

1 Bale, Scriptores (second edition),
p. 217 : ' in Nordovolgia Wulkerellus
presbyter Guilhelmo filio, ut legitimo
heredi, sacerdotium de Dyssa reliquit.'
We have no further knowledge of the
dispute. The patronage of the church
must, however, have been claimed by
the lords of Diss ; for in 1216 Robert
de Goldingham has letters of presen-

tation from the king to the church of
' Disco.' owing to the fact that the
lands of Robert FitzWalter were then
in the king's hands. Rot. Pat. (ed.
Hardy), i. 190.

2 Bale, Votaryes (ed. 1551), fo.
98 b. See Blomfield, Hist. Norfolk,
i. 11, which first called my attention
to this fact.

MASTEK KALPH DE DICETO 39

Walter FitzRobert.1 Although the great position and high character
of Richard de Lucy would give the historian an ample opportunity
of dilating on the virtues of a fellow- townsman, he nowhere mentions
him with such special remark. The Bigods and the Mandevilles, on
the contrary, the patrons of the priories of Thetford and Walden,
under whom Ralph held the livings of Finchingfield and Aynho,
receive especial mention : the former with additional particulars of
personal history, and the latter in terms of exceptional compliment.2

In the third place, it is to be considered that, with one possible The claim of
exception, no historical writer before the seventeenth century seems anoienta°*
to have thought of identifying Dicetum with Diss. The one apparent
exception is that of the author of the ' Livere des Reis de Britanie,'
who wrote in the time of Edward I.3 This writer, translating
directly or mediately from the Imagines, describes the pious founder
of the cemetery of S. Thomas of Canterbury at Acre as William the
chaplain of ' Rauf de Disze, le haut den de Londres.' In this case
it is probable that Disze (or Disze) is simply a retranslation of Diceto,
but at first sight it looks like an intentional identification with Diss.
Setting aside, however, this instance, we find such a number of Early
curious misreadings of the name as proves that the early writers
had no idea of connecting it with a well-known English town. p!°fowith
Gilbert Foliot, when he first made acquaintance with Ralph, called
him Diotecensis, a sufficient proof that he did not recognise the
place from which the name was derived. Some still stranger forms
are mentioned by Selden in the Prolegomena to Twysden's ' Decem
Scriptores.' Thomas of Walsingham, the learned and industrious various mis-
compiler at St. Alban's, calls our author Radulfus de Luzeto ; 4 the name*
the manuscripts of Higden's Polychronicon have Radulfus de Byzeto,
which Trevisa translated ' Raulf le Bruys,' and which appears in
Caxton as ' Raph de Bruys ; ' 5 Bale in the first edition of the
Scriptores called him ' Radulphus de Rizeto ' ; 6 John Ross of

1 Blomfield, Hist. Norf. i. 2. of Lesnes Abbey in 1178 (ib. p. 425) ;

2 William of Mandeville is spe- but in the account of the rebellion of
eially spoken of in connexion with his 1173 not even his name occurs,
expedition to the east, when he pre- 3 ' Le livere de reis de Angleterre,'
sented several churches with cloths p. 256. See also Mr. Glover's note in
brought from Constantinople (Eolls the Introduction, p. xii, where De-
Series ed. vol. i. p. 428) ; his marriage, cize is suggested as the true Dicetum.
which took place at Pleshey, within Diss does not seem to have occurred
Ealph's archidiaconal jurisdiction to Mr. Glover.

(vol. ii. p. 3) ; his victories in Flanders 4 Walsingham, ed. Camden, p. 55 ;

ii. 32) ; and his death (vol. ii. p. 73). ed. Biley, vol. i. p. 34.
For particulars about Hugh Bigod see 5 Higden, lib. vii. cap. 39, ed.

vol. i. pp. 248, 377, 378, 385. Richard 1538.

de Lucy is mentioned as excommuni- a Scriptores (ed. 1549), fo. 97. It

cated by Becket in 1166 (vol i. p. 318), is corrected in the second edition,
and in connexion with the foundation

40

THE HISTORICAL WORKS OF

The origin
of the claim

< i Diss

Accepted
in recent
times

Warwick had read it ' Ralph de Duceto ' ; and John Pyke, who
largely used the books before us, referred to the writer more than
once as ' Ralph de Doiceto.' 1 In the collections made by Edward I.
on the question of the over-lordship of Scotland, the name appears
in the printed copies as ' Dizeto.' 2 The early bibliographers were
content to call him by the name by which he called himself, but
were in some doubt as to his nationality. Leland confessed himself
unable to determine whether he was an Englishman,3 and did not
include him in the list of the writers of Britain. Bale called him
an Englishman, but he contented himself with the usual generalities
that show how little he knew about him beyond the existence of his
works. Pits followed Bale and Leland. The identification with
Diss appeared first, I believe, in the second edition of Dugdale's
History of S. Paul's, published in 1716, with the author's own cor-
rections, by Dr. Maynard.4 We are not told whether in this par-
ticular case the addition had Dugdale's authority, and the loose,
inaccurate way in which it is given would seem to suggest that it
had not. In the list of the deans Ralph de Diceto is said, in a
parenthesis, to be of 'Disca in com. Suffolk.' Dugdale himself
must have known that Diss was in Norfolk. However this may be,
Henry Wharton either was ignorant of the conjecture, which was
published several years after his death, or refused to accept it ; 5 and
Gale, who mentions that he had seen the form ' Dissetum ' in the
chronicles of Walden Abbey, does not proceed to argue from the
fact.6 Tanner does not notice it in his Bibliotheca. Yet it com-
mended itself to the authors of the Histoire Litt6raire de France,
who, finding somewhere the name of ' Thomas de Disce, a priest of
the province of York,' withdrew somewhat hastily a claim which
they had prepared to make on behalf of France as the native country
of Ralph de Diceto.7 There were several places in France which
might be understood by Dicetum, but there was a Diss in England,
which furnished to them a satisfactory solution of the question. It

1 Selden, Proleg. to Twysden's
' Decem Scriptores,' p. xxix.

* Feed. i. 769.

* 'Fuit doctor Theologies, at non
satis mihi constat num etiam Anglus
fuerit ; ' Dugdale, 8. Paul's (ed. 1658),
p. 283. Bale and Wharton call him
English, and their judgment would be
valuable if we were certain that the
contrary view had ever been presented
to them. See Wharton's Appendix to
Cave's Historia Litteraria, and Bale as
quoted above.

4 It does not appear in the edition
of 1658, pp. 9, 48 ; it is in Maynard's

edition, pp. 10, 51 ; and repeated in
Ellis's, p. 7.

* Wharton, ' de decanis Londo-
niensibus,' p. 203. Of. Aug. Sac. ii.
p. xxvii.

' In the preface to the ' Quindecim
Scriptores,' A.D. 1691. The MS.
which Gale saw, and which is now
MS. Arundel 29, is a seventeenth cen-
tury transcript. The name is spelled
Disceto in the text of this MS., but
the form Disseto may occur in the
margin. See below, p. 63.

7 Hist. Litt. vol. xvi. p. 499.

MASTER RALPH DE DICETO 41

is on their authority, we may presume, that recent writers have
called our author ' Ealph of Diss.'

The proper form of the name is ' Diceto,' as it is given in all Spelling of
the manuscripts and records which proceeded directly from the
author's hand ; but very soon after his death, in the records of his
cathedral it is found written ' Disceto ' ; l the modern copy of the
Chronicle of Walden has the same form, and it is found also in a
document which will be adduced farther on, issued by Bishop Hugh
of Lincoln before the death of Ealph. There seems to be no ancient
authority for the form Disseto ; and Dizeto rests on a document
issued a hundred years after his time.

The form ' Dicetum ' itself, according to the analogies of Apparent
mediasval Latin and French, would naturally represent the French on™ name
Dissai, as Alnetum represents Aulnay, Fraxinetum Fresnay,
Salicetum Saussai, or as Virenetum represents the English Verney.
But the parallel halts in one important point, for there is no tree
' dicus,' ' dica,' or ' dix,' which is required to make it complete ; nor
does the word occur in French geography any more than in English.
It seems lawful to infer from this that it is an artificial name,
adopted by its bearer as the Latin name of a place with which he was
associated, but which had no proper Latin name of its own. So
explained it may belong to some English place, Diss, Dicton, Ditton,
or other, or to a French Dissai, Dizy, or Disse ; but with this differ-
ence, that whilst it has no proper relation with the English names,
it stands in a true etymological relation to the French. There are Places in
in the province of Maine three places of the name required : 2 Dissai- whichemight
sous-de-Lude, known in Latin documents as Diceium ; Disse-sous- !
Ballon, and Dissai-sous-Courcillon, near Chateau du Loir, Latinised
as Disiacus. In other parts of France are found Dizy, in the de-
partment of the Marne in Champagne, and Dizy in that of the Aisne
in Picardy ; while there is Dicy in that of the Yonne in Burgundy.
The neighbourhood of Le Mans has perhaps the first claim, if we
consult the internal evidence of our author's writings. The great
care bestowed on the history of the counts of Anjou is sufficient to
call attention to it. Either Dissai-sous-Courcillon, which was be-
stowed by Bishop Siegfrid 3 on Fulk the good count of Anjou, might
allege in its favour the prominence given to that count in the
Abbreviationes ; or Disse-sous-de-Lude, one half of which was given
by Bishop Ulger of Angers to his cathedral, might adduce the verses

1 See Statutes of S. Paul's (ed. brooke (A.D. 1382-1405) writes Disseto.

Simpson), pp. 33, 109, 125, 174, where - Cauvin, Geographic ancienne du

it is written Disceto ; at p. 63 Dean diocese du Mans ; Institut des Pro-

Baldock (A.D. 1294-1303) writes it vinces de France, vol. i. s. vv.

Dyceto ; and at p. 153 Bishop Bray- 3 Gallia Christiana, ii. 135.

42

THE HISTORICAL WORKS OF

Obscurity of
nationality

Some points
suggest a
French
nationality

about Ulger which Ralph has written in the margin of his book
under the years 1189-1142. At the utmost, however, we can only
say that etymologically the balance inclines in favour of one of these
towns, and would give Ralph a French nationality which there is little
in his books to refute and some slight circumstances to countenance.
Internal evidence on a point like this may be read almost any
way. Our author's writings nowhere contain any statement that he
was an Englishman ; if they did, such a statement at the period at
which he wrote might mean no more than that he was born of
French descent in England. Neither do they contain any assertion
that he was a Frenchman ; if they did, it might mean no more than
that he was sprung from the Normans of the Conquest. As to the
indirect evidence which may be sought in the tone and spirit of his
narrative, little can be said. The early portions of the Abbreviationes,
in which, if he were English, some signs of English sympathy might
be expected, are merely extracts from previous writers. No definite
inferences can be drawn from the plan of selection, from the modifica-
tions, the omissions, or additions of the compiler. The descriptions
of Angers and Aquitaine which are the purple patches of the first
pages of the Imagines, and which may be thought to prove that Ralph,
when he began that work, contemplated something more ambitious
in tone, and more comprehensive in character, than a mere book of
annals, are in this respect worthy of special attention. The picture of
Angers is drawn by one who was fairly well acquainted with the site ;
no such picture of an English city occurs in the book. We are not
indeed assured that the description is not extracted from the work of
some other author ; in common with the other Angevin memoranda
it is claimed for another hand ; and, although I hope to be able to
show that the grounds upon which that particular claim is based are
untenable, the disproof of the claim of one competitor does not prove
the claim of the other. Another indication, stronger perhaps than
this, may be found in the fact that towards the close of the Abbre-
viationes, at that point, that is, of the work at which the author is
passing from his extracts from earlier writers to the record of his
own personal reminiscences, the greater part of the matter which
cannot be referred to older authority concerns either the church of
S. Paul in London, which was his final home, or contemporary events
in France. As the memoranda touching S. Paul's may be easily ac-
counted for by his connexion, lifelong as it would seem to have been,
with that cathedral, the references to French history, to the visit of
Eugenius III. to Paris, the election of the archbishop of Bourges
and consequent interdict, the crusade and the taxation which was
caused by it, may be due to the fact that in his youth, in a native
home in France, he had been struck with these events. But it is

MASTER RALPH DE DICETO 43

quite as probable that he remembered them because at the time they Nothing
occurred he was a student in the University of Paris. The question by these
of nationality is really involved in the same obscurity as the mean-
ing of the name ; but that Ealph was an Englishman of the period
of amalgamation, an Englishman in his sympathy with the sound
legislation of Henry II., and with the national aspirations of the re-
constituted England, there can be no doubt.

Equally uncertain are the point of our author's parentage and Probable
the date of his birth. Although we can follow him through fifty author's
years of a somewhat distinguished career, we find no traces of great
age at the close, no signs of youthful action or premature promotion
at the beginning. If he had been more than eighty when he died,
some one of the many annalists of the time would almost certainly
have recorded the date and circumstances of his death. Yet, unless
we suppose him to have been exceptionally young when, in the year
1152, he was made archdeacon, he could not have been much under
eighty when he died. As, however, it is necessary to have some
hypothetical string on which to arrange the known events of his life,
we may suppose him to have been born between 1120 and 1130.
His notices of events touching the history of S. Paul's begin in
1186, and certainly have the appearance of personal recollections.

There are some points, which now meet us, that suggest a not was he con-
impossible theory of the parentage of Ealph de Diceto. He was the family
appointed to his archdeaconry by Bishop Kichard II. of Belmeis ; the
office of archdeacon was very frequently reserved by the bishops
for their nearest kinsmen ; the family of Belmeis for more than
half a century was all-powerful in the chapter of S. Paul's ; and
Kalph more than once betrays a tenderness as to clerical marriage
and the propriety of a son succeeding to his father's benefice. Some
illustration of the scenes in which his early years were passed may
result from a short examination of these points.

In 1108 Richard I. of Belmeis was made bishop of London. Family of
His family derived their name from the Norman village of Beaumais
on the Dive, Bellus Mansus. He had himself risen to importance in
the service of the house of Montgomery, had been sheriff of Shrop-
shire under the earls of that house, Roger, Hugh, and Robert of
Belesme,1 and had probably recommended himself to the king by his
fidelity and loyalty at the time of the rebellion of the last-mentioned
earl. In his own person and by his kinsmen he founded an im-
portant Shropshire family, before he became a bishop. As bishop he

1 Orderic. Vital, lib. xi. cap. 31 ; found in Eyton's History of Shrop-

Ann. Winton. Ang. Sac. i. 297 ; shire, vol. ii. pp. 193 sq. ; a pedigree,

Eadmer, Hist. Nov. pp. 96, 97. The partly conjectural, is there given,

best account of the family will be which cannot be entirely accepted.

44

THE HISTORICAL WORKS OF

Bishop
Richard I.

How
Richard of

Beimels
promoted
his kinsfolk

Richard IL
of Belmeis

Quarrel in
the chapter
of S. Paul's

showed himself a great prelate of the true Norman type, a magnificent
builder, a great state official, and a most liberal benefactor to his
church. He is said to have devoted the whole of his episcopal
revenue to the restoration of his cathedral ; he founded the cathedral
schools ; he obtained great privileges for the chapter from the king ;
and, by purchasing and enclosing land and houses round 8. Paul's,
he formed the churchyard and neighbouring streets into a sort of
cathedral close.1 As was the common practice, he provided out of
the patronage of the see for several of his kinsmen. One nephew,
William, son of his sister Adelina, was dean of 8. Paul's from 1111
to 1188 ; Kalph of Langford and Richard of Belmeis, sons of Walter
the bishop's brother, were made canons ; a a still nearer kinsman,
Walter the bishop's son, was prebendary of Newington, and appears
in the Great Roll of the Pipe for the 81st year of Henry I. as ' filius
episcopi Londoniensis,' paying ten marks for a right judgment
touching the church of Illing.3 Another of the family, William, was
archdeacon of either London or Colchester.4 The position thus
created for the family was defended by them as a part of their in-
heritance, and not without the quarrels incidental to family parties
of the kind. Shortly before his death in 1127, the bishop appointed
his nephew Richard, who was still a child,5 archdeacon of Middlesex.
Gilbert the Universal, who succeeded to the see in 1128, held it for
only six years, and bis death in 1184 was followed by a disputed
election and a vacancy which lasted until 1141. It is possible that
the dean William wished to be elected, or to force his nominee upon

1 Wharton, Episc. Lond., pp. 46-50.

2 Eyton regards Ralph of Langford
as sister's son to the bishop, and
supposes that his mother had married
a man of the name ; but the words of
our author (R. S. ed. vol. i. p. 250) seem
clearly to prove that he was brother of
the second bishop Richard, and in that
case his name of Langford would be
derived from one of the many Lang-
fords or Longf ords where he may have
had preferment.

* Rot. Pip. 31 Hen. I. ; Newcourt,
Repertorium, i. 186.

4 See below, p. 45. This enumera-
tion probably does not exhaust the
list of the bishop's kinsmen in the
chapter. Richard of Belmeis was
buried in the priory of S. Osyth, which
he founded, with the epitaph, ' Hie
jacet Ricardus Beaumeis cognomento
Unfits Londoniensis episcopus, vir
probus et grandaevus per totam vitam
laboriosus, f undator noster religiosus,
qui multa bona nobis et ministris

ecclesiffl sum S. Pauli contulit ; obiit
xvi. kal. Jan. 1127; cujus animee
propitietur Deus.' Weever, Sep. ' Mon.
p. 607; Mon. Angl. vi. 308; New-
court, ii. 455; Eyton, ii. 200. I do
not know the date of the inscription,
but it is curious that a Richard Ruff us
was archdeacon of Essex for several
years during the century, and that
another Richard Ruffus was pre-
bendary of Twyford in 1181 and hold-
ing certain lands of the church which
had been let to his predecessor of the
same name. Moreover, Ailwardns
Ruffus was archdeacon of Colchester
from 1150-1162 or thereabouts; and
Guido Ruffus was the last dean of
Waltham. Archdeacon Hale, how-
ever, doubts whether the archdeacon
Richard is rightly called Ruffus ;
Domesday of S. Paul's, p. Ixxxvii.

4 ' Nondum plene pubes' ; it was a
common practice to nominate very
young men as archdeacons and send
them to Paris or Bologna to be educated.

MASTER RALPH DE DICETO 45

the chapter, but he was opposed by his kinsmen ; a large party of
the canons joined, however, in electing Abbot Anselm of S. Edmund's.
The dean appealed, but his relations took part against him, carried
their treasures to Kome, where they found the church in a state of
schism, and obtained for a time at least possession of the estates of
the see for Anselm. The dean was supported by Kalph of Langford
and Richard of Belmeis, who in 1138 obtained from the Pope a
definitive sentence which sent Anselm back to his abbey. The custody
of the bishopric was, however, intrusted to Bishop Henry of Winchester,
and the death of the dean, which occurred the same year, left the
see unclaimed until, in 1141, the empress gave it to Eobert de Sigillo.

The hold of the family on the church was not shaken by this, continued
Ealph of Langford was elected as successor of his cousin in the family on
deanery, and Richard of Belmeis, whose archdeaconry had been held
in trust for him by a chaplain of the bishop named Hugh, obtained
from Rome a commission of judges, who compelled Hugh against
his will to resign in his favour. The reign of Stephen was altogether
a stormy time for S. Paul's. When the empress lost her hold upon
London, her Bishop Robert went into exile. William the archdeacon,
' cum gente eorum qui a Bello Manso traxere cognomen,' ] so far
from showing proper filial obedience, did their utmost to reduce indepemi-
their bishop to destitution; and again in 1148, when the English family in
bishops were suspended by the Pope for not attending the council of chaptei
Rheims, the archdeacon and his party set an example of contumacy
by appealing against the sentence. In the obscure intrigues of this
period of Stephen's reign it is impossible to speak with confidence
on such a point ; but if we may depend on the Historia Pontificalis,
which records the fact, and which is now believed to be the work of
John of Salisbury, the archdeacon and his party were now playing
into the hands of the king. We cannot, however, trace more con-
sistency in the ecclesiastical than in the baronial intrigues of this
complicated time.

1 Historia Pontificalis, Pertz, Mon. cognomen.' Who this archdeacon

Hist. Germ. vol. xx. p. 532 : ' Verum was is not quite clear. There was a

primi omnium crimen inobedientise William archdeacon of Colchester in

incurrerunt Lunclonienses, confugien- 1162, S. T. C. iv. 37 ; and in 1150 the

tes ad appellationem (sc. in 1148), four archdeacons were Richard Bel-

cum tamen in litteris apostolicis esset meis of Middlesex, Richard [Ruffus] of

inhibita appellatio. Fecerant hoc Essex, and William and Ailward of

jam alia vice, quando episcopus eorum, London and Colchester. This William

bonse memorise Robertus, expulsus est; is called archdeacon of London in

cui hanc exhibuere devotionem, ut 1152 (S. T. C. v. 184), but the ex-

omni diligentia procurarent ne patri pression may be used loosely ; and I

exul anti in aliquo prodessent. Horum cannot be quite sure whether there

signifer et in hac et in ilia causa fuit were one or two archdeacons of the

Guillelmus archidiaconus cum gente name, or which archdeaconry Ailward

eorum qui a Bello Manso traxere really held. But see p. 57 below.

46

THE HISTORICAL WORKS OF

Question of

. ; i-<-o;.:, I

election

Election of
Richard II.
of Beimels

In 1151 the see of London was again vacant : Robert de Sigillo
was dead, and there was an evil report of poison. Eugenius III., acting
doubtless at the instigation of the empress's party, directed the canons
to elect within three months a fit candidate, ' virum honestum et
litteratum et religionis habitu decoratum.' The demand that the
bishop of London should be a monk, or regular canon, struck the
chapter with dismay ; the majority of the canons applied to Rome
and obtained an explanation of the last words as including the
order of secular canons.1 But the king also interposed difficulties : 2
unable to force a nominee of his own upon the chapter, he deter-
mined to make at least a pecuniary profit out of the election ; and
although he had by charter at the beginning of his reign confirmed
the right of free election to the cathedral churches, he exacted a sum
of five hundred pounds from 8. Paul's for leave to act upon the
canonical right. At last enabled to proceed to election, the chapter
fixed on Richard of Belmeis, the archdeacon of Middlesex, on whcm
of course devolved the duty of making good the fine which Stephen
had demanded. The debt thus incurred hampered him all his life.
The election was not acceptable to the magnates, and the family
interest had to be employed at Rome before it was recognised.
Eugenius III. had to use his direct influence in securing the appoint-
ment,3 and Gilbert Foliot, the energetic counsellor of the Angevin
party, had an important share in the negotiation.4 The bishop elect
was already in possession of considerable preferment, and he had
held the deanery of S. Alkmund's at Shrewsbury, one of the ancient
collegiate foundations that had survived the reforming zeal of the
Norman lords. Like his uncle and predecessor, he favoured the
religious orders ; the earlier Richard had founded the priory of
S. Osyth in Essex for Austin canons ; his nephew transferred his
collegiate endowment to found an Arroasian priory at Lilleshull.5

1 Historia Pontificalis, Pertz.xx. 545.

2 ' Rex vero eis eligendi libertatem
concedere noluit antequam qoingentas
libras exemplo monachorum Sancti
Augustini ei appenderint. Quo facto
electus eat Ricardus, ejusdem ecclesiae
archidiaconus, qui praefatam pecuniam
non sine nota symoniea dinoscitur
exsolvisse. Ea namque teinpestate
sub optentu libertatis redimendte
pravitatem symoniacam plurimi pal-
liabant.' Hist. Pont., Pertz, xx. 545.

5 Gilbert Foliot writes to the Pope :
' Londoniensis nimirum episcopus
adeo manuum vestrarum opua eat et
creatio, ut ei recte in faciem possit
objici, tu quid babes nisi quod a
domino papa accepisti ? ' S.T.C.v.120.

4 Foliot speaks of the bishop as a
kinsman, S. T. C. v. 40 ; he assisted
in obtaining his election to the see,
ibid. 122.

* There is a charter of Henry I., in
which he gives to Richard of Belmeis,
nephew of the bishop of London, all
that the bishop had held of the king,
which formerly was Oodebald's and
Robert's ; the same Richard is called
archdeacon in a charter of Stephen,
so there seems to be no doubt of his
identity. The Arroasian house at
Lilleshull was founded on the land of
Richard's prebend. Mon. Angl. vi.
262, 263. See too Eyton's Shropshire,
vol. viii. p. 218.

MASTEE EALPH DE DICETO 47

But he was neither monk nor priest. He had been ordained deacon
in 1188. On the 20th of September 1152 at Otford he was ordained
priest by Archbishop Theobald, and on the 28th of the same month
he received episcopal consecration at Canterbury, the archbishop and oonsecra-
his brother Walter bishop of Eochester, Hilary of Chichester, and Bichara n.
Gilbert Foliot himself, officiating.1 Nearly all the biehops of °
England were present on the occasion. The bishop of Winchester,
who was absent, signified his consent to the consecration in a letter
to the archbishop, which our author has preserved, perhaps as being
the first document that came into his hands as the bishop's official
servant ; for Eichard's first act as bishop was to appoint Master He makes
Ealph de Diceto as his successor in the archdeaconry of Middlesex, deacon*10

Considering the great pains with which the ruling family had
tried to concentrate and strengthen their interest in the chapter, it
is improbable that the new bishop should bestow his first piece of
preferment on a stranger. That interest was not exhausted, and
afterwards, when Ealph was dean, we find William of Belmeis, a
nephew of the second Eichard, bestowing on the canons his church
of S. Pancras for the health of the soul of his uncle, and of his father
Eobert of Belmeis.2 The hereditary instinct which worked in the
chapter was extremely likely to affect the appointment to the arch-
deaconry. It was very common for the bishops to appoint their
nearest kinsmen to this confidential office. Numberless examples
may be given at this very period. Archbishop Ealph had given the Cases of
archdeaconry of Canterbury to his brother John ; Archbishop appointed
Theobald, who succeeded him, gave it to his brother Walter ; Bishop kinsmen
Nigel, of Ely, had made his son Eichard his archdeacon ; at Here- arch
ford, Gilbert Foliot had given or procured the appointment for his
kinsman Ealph ; Eobert Peche, bishop of Lichfield, had given the
archdeaconry of Coventry to his son Eichard, who, after two inter-
vening appointments, succeeded him in his see ; Walkelin, arch-
deacon of Suffolk, was nephew of Bishop Everard of Montgomery ; 3

1 Gervase, c. 1370 ; Eolls Series, for verification. The early registers of
vol. i. pp. 295, 296. S. Paul's are of immense value for

2 Newcourt, Eepertorium, i. 190. the illustration of the ecclesiastical
MS. Harleian 6956, fo. 84. This MS., and civic history of London, and it is
which I shall have again to refer to, to be hoped that some of them may
contains Dr. Matthew Button's ex- soon be printed.

cerpts from the records of the dean 3 Walkelin was one of the class of

and chapter of S. Paul's. Most of archdeacons whose lives led to the

the books that Button saw, if not all, eonclusion that ' no archdeacon could

are still in the muniment room of the be saved.' Be gave great trouble to

cathedral, and I have to thank the Archbishop Theobald and John of

dean, Dr. Church, and the librarian, Salisbury, and defied the Pope as his

Dr. Sparrow Simpson, for a liberal uncle Eobert of Belesme had defied

permission to use them. I refer, how- the king. Be had a ' focaria ' who

ever, to the Button MS. as easier on one occasion of his return from

48

THE HISTORICAL WORKS OF

Tenderness
of Ralph on
the question
of clerical
marriage

at Salisbury, Bishop Roger appointed his nephew Alexander, and
Jocelin, who succeeded him, appointed his son Reginald ; at York,
Geoffrey the archdeacon was nephew of Roger the archbishop. If
then we should incline to the conjecture that Ralph de Diceto was a
near relation of Richard of Belmeis, we should not wrong the
bishop by imputing to him exceptional nepotism. Nor, as I have
remarked, are there wanting in our author's own works some indica-
tions that the question of clerical marriage and legitimacy had a
special interest for him. Dean Milman, in his short sketch of
Ralph's career, in the annals of S. Paul's, has noticed particularly
the words which occur in the Abbreviationes under the year 1074
on the measures taken by Gregory VII. against the married clergy.
The dean adduces the passage as showing that Ralph was not
thoroughly imbued with Hildebrandine principles, at all events upon
this point. It is true that the words are not really our author's,
but part of an extract from Sigebert of Gemblours, who nearly a
century before had written against the allegations made by laymen
against married priests ; but the fact that Ralph had incorporated
them without reservation in his own compilation may reasonably be
regarded as showing that he did not disapprove of the sentiment
they contained. His special references, again, to the Panormia of
Ivo of Chartres for precedents in which sons had succeeded their fathers
in high clerical preferment look the same way : ' The apostolic see
has permitted the sons of priests, whose conversation has been
approved in monasteries or religious churches, to be promoted to the
priesthood and even to the highest grade of the ministry ; in some
instances we have heard of the sons of bishops being promoted, after
some intermediate appointment, in the very churches in which their
fathers had ministered.' This was in fact one of the three canonical
points on which Ralph was specially interested, the other two being
the restoration of a deposed prelate and the lawfulness of translation,
the latter of which was brought prominently to his notice when he
had to transact the business of Foliot's removal from Hereford to
London. One famous passage which has often been quoted from
the Abbreviationes seems to militate against this view. In 1187, he
tells us, the ' focariee of certain canons who are called secular were
carried off and dragged to the Tower, not without dire disgrace, and
kept there bound for many days ; they returned to their own, but
not without personal mockery, loss of reputation, and cost of money.'
It is not probable that Ralph, if he wrote these words at all, meant
them to apply to his own church. They appear in only one of the

Rome, presented him with a child, the Pope,
whom for the sake of the jest he Epist. 27.
christened Adrian, or Adriana, after

See John of Salisbury,

MASTEE KALPH DE DICETO 49

manuscripts drawn up under his own eye, and in that not without
suspicious marks of erasure. If they are genuine, however, they
seem, from the very reticence with which they are introduced, to
indicate some feeling in the writer that he was not upon safe ground.
It is not then, I think, improbable that Ralph de Diceto was son or
nephew to Ralph of Langf ord, whom, with one person intervening, he
succeeded in the deanery of S. Paul's. The supposition would not
indeed explain the meaning of his name, but a clerical pedigree
might account for the fact of his bearing a name not elsewhere
recognised.

Bishop Richard was not able to secure the promotion of his opposition
nominee without a considerable effort, such as again he would appoint- s
have scarcely made in behalf of any but a near friend. It is in a archdeacon
letter upon this point that we get our first documentary illustration
of our author's career. Gilbert Foliot, now bishop of Hereford,
writes to Pope Eugenius III. on behalf of Bishop Richard. Both
Foliot and the Pope were strong partisans of the empress and her
son, and from the way in which the former speaks of the bishop as
having been indebted for his promotion to the Pope's direct action,
in opposition to the wishes and in spite of the conspiracies of the
magnates, we may conclude that Richard was likewise, as Ralph de
Diceto certainly was, a supporter of the house of Anjou. The Pope
seems, not perhaps without cause, to have thought himself entitled
to some share in the fruits of victory, and he had bestowed the
archdeaconry vacated by the bishop's consecration on John of
Canterbury, a young clerk who, with Thomas Becket and Roger of
Pont 1'Eveque, was running the race for preferment in Church and
State, and who afterwards, as John ' aux blanches mains,' was bishop
of Poictiers and archbishop of Lyons. Richard had, however,
before the papal appointment was made, or certainly before it was
announced, conferred the post on Ralph de Diceto. Foliot, in the
letter referred to, brings this fact in a very determined way to the
Pope's notice. The newly made bishop was so completely the Poiiot's
creation of the Pope that he could scarcely be supposed to claim theepope
anything as his own ; but as a matter of fact he had bestowed the promotion
archdeaconry before he knew the Pope's pleasure concerning it ; he
was persuaded that it was in ignorance of Ralph's appointment that
the Pope had ordered it to be given to John of Canterbury,1 and if
evidence was necessary the bishop of Lincoln, Robert de Chesnei, a
faithful friend of both bishop and archdeacon, and a man whose

1 ' Archidiaconatum enim quern ante concessum alter! fuisse vestram
liberalitate laudabili domino Johanni credimus latere prudentiam.' S. T. C.
Cantuariensi donandum mandastis, v. 121.

E

50

THE HISTORICAL WORK8 OF

Ralph's
residence in
the Univer-
sity at Paris

His friend-
ship with
Arnulf of
Lisienx

word could not be disputed, was ready to swear to the fact.1 The
Pope must not put the newly made bishop to shame 'by overruling
the appointment. Nor was the new archdeacon a man to be set
aside ; he was a man of established character for both probity and
learning. The request seems to have been granted, and Ralph
retained the archdeaconry. The disappointed competitor found a
rich compensation in the treasurership of York, to which he
succeeded in 1168 or 1164 ; and it is interesting to note the way in
which our author sets down the several steps of his late prefer-
ment,2 and the friendly way in which he consults him on points of
history.

This letter throws some light on Ralph's age. He is already
' magister,' probably not much under the age for ordination as priest.
The same word indicates that he had already studied in a university,
which could be no other than that of Paris, where we know him to
have passed two periods of work.3 If this were so, we may fairly
infer that he himself witnessed the reception of Eugenius III. at
S. Genevieve's, in 1146, on the occasion when the Pope's servants were
wounded ; he may have been in France during the interdict imposed
on account of the quarrel at Bourges, and have seen the starting of
the second crusade. If we suppose him to be now thirty, he may
have been at Paris as early as the year 1140 and have heard with
his own ears the teaching of Hugh of S. Victor, which directly or
indirectly impressed him so deeply that he not only incorporated one
long passage of his writing in the ' Abbreviations, ' but introduced an
extract from it into the statute book of his cathedral.4 Whatever
may have been the precise limits of his first residence at Paris, it
was during that residence that he made the acquaintance of Arnulf
of Lisieux, the ambitious, clever prelate whose letters preserve so
many interesting notices of the time. In one of these letters Arnulf
writes to Ralph as a friend and contemporary, not as we should

1 ' Ipse quidem Lincolniensis tes-
tatur et jursre paratus est, dominum
Londoniensem, antequam vol until tern
vestram aut scripto aut aliquo refe-
rente cognoverit, pradictum arohidia-
conatum magistro Radalfo Dioteccnsi
[so the MS.], cui et ad doctrinam
Bcientia et ad honestatem mores
exuberant, concessisse.' 8. T. C. v.
121. In another letter to the bishop
of London (S. T. C. v. 169, 170),
Foliot refers to this or a similar case
occurring in 1152 or 1163 : ' quod
ante susceptas domini papae litteras in
personam omnium testimonio idoneam
procuratoris beneficium contulisti,
ratum manere desideras.'

z His consecration is recorded in
1163, R. 8. ed. vol. i. p. 311 ; his promo-
tion to Lyons and resignation of that
see, vol. ii. p. 120 ; and his pilgrimage
to Canterbury in 1194. The letter on
the subject of the precedence of the
see of Lyons and John's answer are
entered on the first page of the
Abbreviationes ; see vol. i. pp. 5, 6.
Ralph introduces him as putting down
a rebellion in Poictou in 1176.

1 See next page, note. Buleeus, Hist.
Univ. Paris, ii. 769.

4 Abbreviationes, R. 8. ed. vol. i.
p. 31. Registrum Statutoruin, ed.
Simpson, p. 9,

MASTER EALPH DE DICETO

51

•expect a patron to write to a protege.1 The two had been intimate
friends, and had had a common friend, Ralph de Flur, whose early
death was a grief to both of them. Arnuif became bishop in 1141 ;
if the friendship were formed whilst Arnuif was a student, we might
bring Ealph to Paris long before the death of Hugh of S. Victor,
ivhich is said to have occurred in 1141. When Arnuif in 1182
retired from his see, after an episcopate of forty years, he took refuge
in a house which he had built within the precincts of the abbey of
S. Victor. Likely enough it was there that he and Ralph with him
had studied in his youth, after he had learned all that he could learn
in his brother's schools at Se"ez. That Ralph's first residence at
Paris cannot have been much earlier than this may be inferred from
his silence as to the history of Abelard and the other great men who

Arnuif of

1 Arnuif. Lexov. Ep. 16. The
interest of the extract, for the whole
letter cannot be here given, may ex-
cuse its great length: — . 'Audivi te
causa studiorum Parisios advenisse,
audivi et laetatus sum ; laatatus equi-
dem ut ejus quern diligebam prsesena
me Isetificaret aspectus et jucunda
•collocutionis alternte collatio delec-
taret. Optabam quoque ut aliqua
exhibendi tibi officii refulgeret occasio,
cujus me dudum merita praevenerunt.
Licet enim solum veritas amicitise
requirat affectum, liberale tamen ob-
sequium non excludit, sed eo potius
illustratur, quoniam ut ait sanctus
ille, " probatio dilectionis exhibitio est
operis." Movet autem quod cum
secundo jam veneris, noluisti ad
amicum nee ad momentum etiam
declinare, neque saltern per cursorem
debit® salutationis alloquium paucis
consignatum apicibus destinare. Haesi
diutius, quotiesque ab illis partibus
aliquis apparebat, divinabam quod ille
mihi jucundum Badulfi mei nuntiaret
adventum. Frustratus toties ex hoc
nunc nihil audeo divinare, sed carita-
tem tuam duxi litteris prsesentibus, si
forte obdormierit, excitandam, aut si
quem forte concepit falsa suspicione
languorem de perseverantise mese
nuntio convalescat; noveris enim
nihil tibi apud me de pristina caritate
perisse, sed quasi duplicatus amor est,
cum eum tibi mea mens cogatur
exsolvere, quem aliquando duobus
impendebat affectum. Sublatus si-
quidem est e medio communis amicus
noster Eadulfus de Flur, qui dimidium
animse mese videtur moriens abstu-
lisse. Ipsius mihi semper est colenda

Ralph was

jSm'of0
Sahsbui'y

memoria, ipsius amor semper quibus-
cunque modis id fieri potuerit in-
staurandus. Duobus autem modis
defuncto vieem amicitise judico repen-
dendam, ut primo scilicet piis apud
Deum intercessionibus adjuvetur,
secundo hi quos ipse dilexerat dilec-
tione vicaria diligantur. Inde est
quod amor noster ab illo in te quasi
quodam heereditariae successionis jure
transfusus est, ut jam te non simplici
sed duplicate complectar affectu. Tibi
enim prse ceteris hsec est deferenda
successio, quem ille prse ceteris dilige-
bat, tibique earn quasi quodam testa-
mento specialis amicitise prserogativa
consignat. Gere igitur suum amicitiae
morem, certisque clarescat indiciis
ipsam novas vires de nova duplicatione
traxisse. Scribe autem interim ali-
quid ut in altering utriusque videar
suscepisse sermonem. Injunge quod
vis ut in altero utrique videar obse-
quium praastitisse ; visita nos ut possim
utriusque personam in altero contem-
plari. Scribe, inquam, quia si scrip-
seris, hoc ipsum tibi studii poterit
augere materiam, nee propositi operis
provectum impediet aut proventum.
Injunge aliquid, ut aliqua amicitiae
perseverantis argumenta procedant,
quia earn effieacius comprobat petendi
fiducia quam liberalitas offerendi.
Visita nos quia te cum desiderium
nostrum, turn loci propinquitas, turn
etiam solemnitas invitat. Dominus
quoque Willelmus de Ver ex promis-
sione tenetur ut veniat, vobisque
invicem solatiari poteritis et nobis
sanctse solemnitatis gaudia duplicare.
Valete. Ad Eadulfum de Diceto
archidiaconum Londoniensem.'

E 2

52

THE HISTORICAL WORKS OF

Possible
traces of
Ralph in
attendance '
on his
bishop

Ralph's
second
residence
in Paris

Ralph rector

of Aynhc

were teaching at Paris during the few preceding years. He must
have been a few years junior to John of Salisbury,1 who in the
Metalogicus furnishes us with an exact list of the masters under
whom he himself studied, and who were then in the zenith of their
fame. It is true that Ralph wrote so long after that he may not have
thought it worth while recording mere scattered reminiscences ; but it
is perhaps more likely that he was too young at the time of Abelard's
death to take much heed of the closing scenes of an eventful history.

For the ten years that followed Ralph's promotion to the arch-
deaconry, we know nothing distinctly of his movements. His
notices of the acts of his bishop are, perhaps, a ground for supposing
him to have occasionally attended him as a chaplain. In that
capacity he may have been present at the consecration of archbishop-
Roger of York,2 at the coronation of Henry II., and at the baptism
of the younger Henry, which was performed by the bishop of
London, in 1155. All these events are noted in the ' Imagines,' and
are not derived, as the early entries in that work largely are, from
the Chronicle of Robert de Monte. After the year 1156, the mention
of several events that happened at Paris and in the neighbourhood
possibly indicates that this was the period of Ralph's second residence
in the great university. The letter of Arnulf of Lisieux, which has
been already quoted, is addressed to him as archdeacon, and it was
very common for newly appointed archdeacons to return to the
schools to complete their legal education. Thus Gilbert Foliot had
two of his archdeacons at the same time studying law at Bologna.3
It is not, however, probable that this second visit of Ralph to Paris
would be deferred beyond the tenth year of his appointment.

One other event of our author's life may be placed here. Ralph
had acquired the rectory of Aynho, in Northamptonshire, either
by the direct gift of one of the Mandevilles, probably Earl
Geoffrey II., of Essex, or from the monastery of Walden, which
the Mandevilles had founded, and on which they bestowed the
patronage of Aynho.4 Some time before the year 1164, during the
priorate of Prior William, who died in that year,5 Ralph de Diceto,
as parson of Aynho, appointed, as his perpetual vicar or curate,
Turbert the son of Turbert. No doubt Robert de Chesnei, the
bishop of Lincoln, the intimate friend of Richard of Belmeis, helped

1 John of Salisbury is said to have
been seventy at the time of his death
in 1180.

* Gervase, c. 1376.

* Richard Foliot, archdeacon of
Colchester, and Robert Banastre, arch-
deacon of Essex; S. T. C. v. 835,
336; probably about 1170. Cf. Spici-

legium Liberianum, pp. 610, 618.

4 Aynho was given to Walden by
the founder, Mon. Angl. iv. 141, 149.
Earl Geoffrey II. held the earldom
from 1144 to 1167.

• Hist. Walden, Mon. Angl. iv.
134.

MASTEE KALPH DE DICETO 53

in making the arrangement, and certainly instituted Turbert to the
vicarage.1 Evidence of this institution was adduced long after in
a trial held to determine who the rightful patron of Aynho was.
Besides Aynho, Ealph held also the living of Finchingfield, in Essex, Rector of
which he had received either from the Bigods or from the priory of aejdching"
Thetford, of which they were the benefactors. From this also he
drew a pension, and served the church by a vicar. But at what
date he received Finchingfield there is nothing to show.2

The office of archdeacon was no sinecure. Although a Ralph de
spiritual office, conferred by investiture of ring and book,3 it was j^daicon
concerned chiefly with matters of legal and secular interest, the °eXMlddle~
judicial and pecuniary disputes which in the English Church never
abounded more than at the period before us. It was this constant
entanglement in temporal business which made the archdeacon, of
all clerical officers, the most unpopular with the laity, and which
among the more religious of the clergy suggested an important
doubt, which John of Salisbury amusingly states in a letter to a
newly made archdeacon. Nicolas de Sigillo, a canon of S. Paul's,
had been promoted, no doubt by the influence of the Bishop Eobert
de Sigillo, and had perhaps been disappointed at not being made
archdeacon earlier. He had denied that it was possible for an arch-
deacon to be saved. Yet in 1155, when the archdeaconry of Hunting-
don was offered him, he accepted it, and John of Salisbury wrote to
congratulate him in a bantering letter, expressing his pleasure that
the bishop of Lincoln had convinced him that salvation was possi-
ble for him.4 Ealph's archdeaconry comprised within its jurisdic-
tion about fifty parishes in Middlesex, three deaneries in Essex, and
one deanery in Hertfordshire. That it was the archdeaconry of
Middlesex is certain ; it was the same archdeaconry that Eichard
of Belmeis had held, and is specially named by our author himself.
Dr. Matthew Hutton, an eminent antiquary of the seventeenth cen-
tury, who himself held Ealph's living of Aynho,5 worked out the
proof of this at considerable length and with much learning.

1 See the document given in the 3 So the archdeacon of Derby was
Appendix to the Preface of vol. ii. invested, S. T. C. vi. 68.

No. II. K. S. ed. 4 Joh. Salisb., Ep. 166. It is to be

2 Hubert Walter, when archbishop feared that Nicolas made his arch-
of Canterbury, confirmed a pension of deaconry a stepping-stone to still more
forty shillings per annum, granted by secular promotion ; he acted as a
the prior of Thetford out of the church clerk of the Exchequer and a tallager
of Finchingfield to the abbot and in 1174, Madox, Hist. Exch. p. 485.
monks of Reading, after the death of He farmed the manor of Ardley under
the then incumbent, Ralph de Diceto. the chapter of S. Paul's in 1181.
(E reg. vet. Eliens. inter archiv. ep. Domesday of S. Paul's, pp. 112, 113.
Eliens.) Blomefield, Hist. Norfolk, i. 5 His argument is given by New-
448. On these pensions see Hale, eourt in the Repertorium, vol. i. 34.
Domesday of S. Paul's, pp. xlv, xlvi.

54

THE HISTORICAL WORKS OF

Troubles of
Richard of
Beimels

His legal
decisions
disputed

But it is beyond doubt, and wherever Ralph is called archdeacon of
London it is only loosely, in reference to the fact that he was one of
the four archdeacons of the diocese. The archdeaconry of Middle-
sex was the third in dignity of the four, coming after those of
London and Essex. ' In the choir of 8. Paul's the stall of the
archdeacon of Middlesex was the last on the left side.3 It was not
by itself richly endowed ; like the archdeaconry of London, which
Peter of Blois described as a ' draco,' that had to live on air, a sort
of chameleon, it had very little in the way of revenue to maintain
the dignity of the post.3 A century after Ralph de Diceto held it,
it appears as endowed with procurations and synodals,4 but it is by no
means certain that it possessed these resources in his time. The
revenue from his livings, or from his prebend, if he held one, must
have been his chief provision. Richard of Belmeis was not able to
do much for him.

The poor bishop never overcame the difficulties which he had to
encounter immediately on his promotion. Although he ruled the
diocese of London for ten years, he never got out of debt.5 His
judicial sentences were constantly appealed against, his rights of
patronage infringed, and his supremacy in the chapter disputed.
One great quarrel was with Master Henry of London, the librarian
and master of the schools of S. Paul's, who claimed the archdeaconry
of Colchester.6 Archdeacon Nicolas of London was somehow ousted
from his archdeaconry, and although his conduct in office had been
just and moderate, and his competitor had no real claim to it, the
bishop failed to set matters straight, and he had recourse, through
Foliot, to the Pope for redress.7 Some dozen letters of John of
Salisbury preserve the memory of appeals from the bishop's tribunal
to Archbishop Theobald, or to the Pope.8 The same writer, who
acted as secretary to Archbishop Theobald, tells the Pope on one
occasion that he has had to invest a certain clerk, named Hugh,
contrary to the will of the bishop, with a prebendal stall at S. Paul's : 9
possibly that Hugh de Marinis, or Hugh de Marney, who succeeded

1 Statutes of 8. Paul's, p. 20.

• Ibid. p. 25.

1 Cf. Statutes, Ac., p. 21.

4 ' Ultimo est arohidiaconus Mid-
delsexiffi, cujus victus in procuratione
consistit.' Statutes, p. 25.

• Job. Salisb., Ep. 7 ; S. T. C.
v. 58.

• On this obscure matter, tbe date
of which is difficult to determine, see
Job. Salisb., Ep. 35.

7 It is not clear whether the letter
in question (S. T. C. v. 151) is ad-
dressed to Adrian IV. or to Aleiander

III. Foliot, however, writes in
favour of the archdeacon Nicolas,
who ' absens et innoxius archidia-
conatu quern et juste possidebat et
ministrabat so brie, mil la juris aut
ordinis observationc spoliatns est.'
Nicolas had applied to his bishop for
redress, but failed to obtain it : but he
was in full possession before the
bishop's death.

" See especially letters 10, 11, 18,
18, 22, 39, 58, 87, 117, 118, 132.

' Job. Salisb., Ep. 36.

MASTER RALPH DE DICETO 55

Ealph of Langford as dean. To complete his misfortunes, the The bishop
bishop became a paralytic, x and when, about the year 1160, his IS paralysed
brother Ralph of Langford died, he was no longer considered fit to
manage his own affairs, and the state of his affairs was so bad that he
had great difficulty in finding agents to manage them.2 Robert de
Chesnei, bishop of Lincoln, and Gilbert Foliot, of Hereford, his
relation, who, perhaps, had an eye to the succession, did their best
for him ; they compelled the new dean, Hugh, and Nicolas, the arch-
deacon, to undertake the administration of his property, and they,
after his death, had to maintain tedious proceedings at law against
his creditors. In all this we hear nothing of Ralph de Diceto. No
judgments of our archdeacon are impugned in the archiepiscopal
court ; he is not mentioned as one of the stewards of the poor
bishop's property. He seems, as we shall see, even to have lost or
missed his chance of obtaining a prebendal stall in the cathedral, and
when we find him next it is in Paris. We may, I think, infer that Ralph at
he had spent a considerable part of these years in study there.

Richard of Belmeis died on May 4, 1162, three weeks before the
election of Thomas Becket to the primacy. It was not then he, but
Gilbert Foliot, his successor, whom the biographers of S. Thomas
represent by anticipation as bishop of London, that singly opposed
the election of Becket, if any such opposition were offered.3 Ralph
had perhaps returned to England to attend the deathbed of his
patron, or was summoned to the chapter that elected his successor.
Anyhow, he was employed as the agent of the canons in procuring Employed in
the confirmation of their choice. It was not a simple matter. Since the trans-
the conquest no bishop in England proper had been translated from p0iio"
the see of his consecration except to one of the two metropolitan sees.
Before the conquest there were one or two questionable instances,
and since the conquest Bishop Hervey of Bangor had been trans-
ferred from a Welsh see to an English one ; but the ' postulation '
of Foliot, involving his translation from Hereford to London,
was regarded as exceptional, and as requiring special confirmation
by the Pope. Fortunately, Alexander III. was at Paris. Ralph de
Diceto knew Parisian ways. Furnished with letters from the king,
from Becket, and from his fellow canons, he laid the matter before
the Pope,4 and was listened to. London, it was pleaded, was an

1 Imagines, R. S. ed. vol. i. p. 304. Nativitatem Domini.' Gervase, c.

2 S. T. C. v. 158, 180. 1383.

* Grim, S. T. C. i. 15 ; Rog. Pon- 4 ' Ex relations dilecti filii nostri

tigny, S. T. C. i. 107. ' Mentiuntur Radulfi ecclesise vestrse archidiaconi

plane qui dicunt Londoniensem elec- accepimus quod idem rex desiderat

tioni Thomas archiepiscopi restitisse, plurimum, <fec.' Imagines, vol. i. p.

quia sedes ilia Londonise scilicet illis 309 ; S. T. C. v. 193, 194.
diebus vacavit et postea usque ad

56

THE HISTORICAL WORKS OF

Translation
of Foliot

Ralph
favoured
by Foliot

HiB intro-
duction to
the king

exceptionally important place ; Gilbert Foliot — and this was equally
true — was an exceptionally able man. The king required his services ;
even Becket pleaded for him, an act which caused him bitter remorse
afterwards, when he saw that he had helped to raise the man who
was to overthrow him. Ralph very briefly notes the dates of the
transaction; it is from the papal letter of confirmation that we
learn that he had himself negotiated. The postulation was made,
it would seem, on March 6 ; on the 19th the Pope wrote to Foliot
that he approved of the translation, and on April 28, all the pre-
liminaries being completed, the new bishop, ' in accordance with the
desire of the whole chapter, was solemnly introduced into his see.'

The fortunes of Ralph de Diceto had suffered from the embar-
rassments and incapacity of his patron. He seems to have run a risk
of losing his prebend. But he had an old friend in the new bishop,
who no doubt felt under some obligation towards him for the way
in which he had helped on the translation. An early letter of
Gilbert Foliot, written to the king soon after he became bishop of
London, shows that our archdeacon required powerful aid.1 He is
introduced, curiously enough, to Henry II., in nearly the same
formula as that in which ten years before Foliot had recommended
him to the Pope ; ' eo securius commendamus quod ei et scientiam
ad doctrinam et ad honestatem mores exuberare jamdiu experientia
rerum certa cognovimus.' But to this general recommendation
the writer adds one which was perhaps more potent, his entire love
and full devotion of affection towards the royal person. The special
prayer of the letter is that the king would help Ralph in his great
necessity ; that the portion of his prebend, granted to him and con-
firmed by apostolic and royal authority, may be restored to him in
its integrity. What this prebend was we are not told, and the
records of S. Paul's do not, so far as I can discover, tell what stall

1 ' Domino regi dominus Londo-
niensis salutem et devotum debitae
f idelitatis obsequium. Vestra, domine,
dignos speramus gratia quos in
ecclesia Dei et litteratura commendat
et vita. Inde est quod apod excel-
lentiam vestram olericum nostrum
beati Pauli archidiaconum, Radulfum
de Diceto, eo securius commendamus,
quod ei et scientiam ad doctrinam et
ad honestatem mores exuberare jam-
diu experientia rerum certa cognovi-
mus. Accedit ad hoc amor integer et
affectionis erga YOB plena devotio, ut
TOB ulnis caritatis corde complectens
honor! vestro gloriaeque congratulans
felices vobis in Domino successus sem-
per exoptet, et sibi commissos, ut a

summo rege vobis id impetrent cum se
praestat opportunitas, indesinenter ad-
moneat. Quern in oborta sibi necessi-
tate recurrentem ad vos, nilque nisi
quod juri debetur et aequitati postulan-
tem, cordis intimo supplicamus affectu
quatenus ob Dei reverentiam nostrte-
que petitionis et honestatis ejus, et
exhibits vobis et semper exhibendas
ndelitatis, intuitn, clementcr exau-
diatis, et ut praobendm sum portio,
quam sibi et apostolica et regia vestra
concedit et connrniat auctoritas, ipsi
in integrum restituatur, juxta datam
vobis a Domino sapientiara, tarn juste
quam misericorditer efficiatis.' S. T. C.
vi. p. 1.

MASTER EALPH DE DICETO 57

Ealph de Diceto held before he became dean, when he likewise
became prebendary of Tottenhale. It is possible that the person He is m
instituted by Archbishop Theobald, as John of Salisbury has lo^ng'w
recorded, ousted Ealph from his prebendal stall ; or he may by non- pre
residence during his stay at Paris have disqualified himself for
retaining it. We are not told that he recovered it. Another letter
of Foliot, the address of which is lost, probably refers to a similar
disappointment ; in it the bishop prays the person to whom he
writes to give up ' to our archdeacon E., who has been so long our
clerk and friend, the church of S. John which we have heard was
granted to him by Lambert.' x The letter of introduction to the
king had, however it may have answered its immediate purpose, the
effect of making Ealph personally known to Henry. From this
point of time he is found occasionally about the court or taking part
in public affairs, although he never, so far as we know, became a
chaplain or official clerk of the king. We get two or three glimpses
of him during the Becket struggle.

His position during that stormy period must have been very

trying. His bishop, from whom he had received distinct marks of Becket
confidence and regard, was the chief enemy of Becket in the s
episcopal body — the ' archisynagogus ' whose skill and learning

were made to conduct the king's defence in the memorable dispute.
Ealph's devotion to the king, which is attested not only by Foliot's

1 'Inde est quod dilectionem ves- of Blois, appointed before 1192.

tram . . . rogamus quatenus E. archi- Archdeacons of Middlesex. — Eoger, ob.

diacono, jamdudum clerico et amico cir. 1127. Hugh, as administrator

nostro, ecclesiam Sancti Johannis, for Eichard of Belmeis, 1127-1138.

quam sibi a Lamberto cessam esse Eichard of Belmeis, 1138-1152

accepimus, concedatis.' S. T.C. vi. 36, Ealph de Diceto, 1152-1180. Gil-

37. The following table of the arch- bert archdeacon in 1192.

deacons of the church of London will Archdeacons of Essex.— Eichard

show that for a great part of Ealph's [Euffus], 1142, 1150, 1162. Eobert

tenure of office he was the only per- Banastre, 1168, 1192, 1194 ; edu-

son who could be described as 'E. cated at Bologna, S. T. C. v. 336.

archidiaconus ' ; but it may be added Archdeacons of Colchester. — Ailward,

that the title of Essex or Colchester 1150. Henry of London claimant

is generally given to the holders of between 1152 and 1162. William

those two archdeaconries, so that archdeacon in 1162, S. T. C. iv. 37.

really the only two between which Eichard Foliot archdeacon about

confusion was likely to arise were 1168 and 1170 : at Bologna, S. T. C.

London and Middlesex : v. 308, 309 ; nephew of Gilbert

Archdeacons of London. — William, Foliot, ib. 319, 353. Ealph de Alta

1148 (Hist. Pont. Pertz, xx. 532); Eipa, archdeacon, 1186, 1189; a

subscr. 1150 ; archdeacon at the crusader at Acre.

time of the election in 1152, S. T. C. I have remarked above that I cannot

v. 184. Nicolas, in office before be certain whether Ailward or William

the death of Eichard of Belmeis, in 1150 was archdeacon of London.

S.T.C. v. 158; as early as 1160, Archdeacon Hale, however, agreed

when he attests a grant to Walter with this arrangement, Statutes of S.

Durdent, bishop of Coventry ; in Paul's, p. 173.

1181 (Domesd. of S. Paul's). Peter

58

THE HISTORICAL WORKS OF

Ralph1*
caution in
the Docket
dispute

m« appear-
ance at the
Council of
Northamp-
ton

assertion but by the general tone of his writings, drew him tho
same way. But Becket had been a canon of his own cathedral,1
and no doubt had attached to himself the partisans of the now
reigning house by his faithful service before he was made arch-
bishop ; and Ralph had too much learning and too much ecclesias-
tical feeling not to apprehend great mischief from the threatened
downfall of the primate. That he was very cautious we may be
sure ; for there is an almost total silence in his writings as to the
politico-ecclesiastical side of the contest. Yet his memorials were
not drawn up until long after the martyrdom and canonisation had
tuned all voices to the praises of S. Thomas of Canterbury. If,
like the rest of the religious people of England at the time, he
sympathised more or less with the archbishop, he loved the king
and respected Foliot. We are not, however, to suppose that such
devotion as he showed to the martyr was of a posthumous sort only.
William FitzStephen, the biographer of Becket, telling the story of
the Council of Northampton in October 1164, the great council in
which Becket was tried and from which he fled, sets Ralph de
Diceto for once before us as a distinct personality. It was on the
sixth day of the council, when Becket had resolved to carry his
cross into the king's presence, at once proclaiming his distrust of
his own safety and declaring himself a candidate for martyrdom.
Resisting the arguments of the bishops, he persisted in his resolution
and called forth from Foliot the bitter sneer, ' A fool he was ever,
and a fool he will ever be.' 2 Herbert of Bosham suggested that
Becket should be ready to pronounce the sentence of excommunica-
tion in case anyone laid hands on him. The biographer himself
interposed ; ' Be it far from him ; not so did the holy apostles and
martyrs of God when they were taken and carried away to death ;
rather, if this befall him, let him pray and pardon, and in patience
possess his soul.' He proceeded further to urge patience, and
moved two of the company to tears. John Planeta, hearing these
words, laboured to restrain his rising tears ; likewise Ralph de
Diceto, the archdeacon, afterwards dean of London, wept there very
much on that day.3 William FitzStephen was no doubt a friend of
Ralph's ; they seem to have been in full sympathy on the occasion,
and afterwards we find them telling the story of the martyrdom in
words so similar that it is clear that they must have compared notes

1 According to Newconrt's list
he held the prebend of Reculverland :
that he was a canon of 8. Paul's is
probably implied in our author's
wordB.

1 W. FitzStephen, S. T. C. i. 225.

' ' Johannes Planeta hsec audiens

lacrymas erumpentes laborabat re-
tinere. Similiter et Radulfus de
Diceto archidiaconus Londoniensis
postea decanus, plurimum ea die ibi
lacrymatus eat.' S. T. C. i. 227.
This was written, then, after the year
1180.

MASTER EALPH DE DICETO 59

upon it. Patience was the safest and soundest course ; the tears
were both sincere and politic. If Ealph as a patriotic churchman
had much cause for weeping, as archdeacon of Middlesex he had
much occasion for anxious silence. It could have required no great
penetration to see that the breach between Becket and Foliot, if not
that between Becket and the king, was now become irreparable, and
that henceforth, both in public and in private, a wise man must be
cautious and reticent. Such, however he was actuated, was the
course that he maintained, and by it he seems to have gained repu-
tation as a discreet and temperate man.

So high at this time stood his character for learning and Ralph is
prudence that in 1166, after Becket, in the might of his newly R°ichardofy
acquired legation, fulminated his sentence of excommunication the^Mity
against the king's friends, Ralph was consulted by the astute and ^^nce*'3
experienced minister Richard of Ilchester, as to the way in which
the sentence was to be respected. He has preserved his own
answer, shrouding himself in the ' Imagines ' under the term
' Amicus,' but in the ' Series Causas ' acknowledging it as his work.
It is a very cautious production ; the minister is warned that His letter
Becket's voluntary exile has not deprived him of his spiritual ofiichester
authority, and that Richard's position as archdeacon of Poictiers did
not exempt him from the obedience which, as a native of the diocese
of Bath,1 he owed to the primate of the English Church. Nothing
could be gained by contemning the sentence, nothing could be lost
by respecting it. Such a curse could be valid only against the
guilty : Christian humility and public policy alike dictated obedience.
It is probable that Richard submitted to the sentence in accordance
with this advice, as Gilbert Foliot himself did under like circum-
stances in 1169. The calm and conciliatory tone of the letter
perhaps suggested the employment of Ralph de Diceto as a
mediator, or at least as a messenger, between the bishops who
adhered to the king and the angry archbishop.

Becket became legate on the 24th of April 1166 ; his excom- Ralph goes

• i- t j.i_ • • i i • 3 A. \rt i j- as messenger

mumcation of the ministers was proclaimed at Vezelay, according to to Becket
Ralph de Diceto, writing long afterwards, on Ascension Day ;
according to the better authority of John of Salisbury, who wrote at
the time, on Whit Sunday, the 12th of June.2 The English bishops

1 The right of the church of Can- in S. T. C. iv. 225-227, describing

terbury to sanction or forbid the pro- the presentation of the letters of

motion of Englishmen in foreign legation by Berengar to the priest

churches appears in the negotiation officiating at high mass at S. Paul's

for the promotion of John of Salisbury on Ascension Day. The archdeacon

to the bishopric of Chartres. Nicolas was present ; but as nothing

- Job. Salisb., Ep. 145. I follow is said about Ralph we may presume

Canon Robertson's arrangement of that he was not.
these details. There is a graphic letter

60

THE HISTORICAL WORKS OF

He carries a
letter from
the bishops

Beckefs
mention of
Ralph

He carries

from the
king to
Foliot

who had, from the moment they heard of the issue of the legatine
commission, been in dread of having the same sentence issued
against themselves, met at London on Midsummer Day, and
appealed to the Pope against the threatened excommunication.
They also drew up a long letter in which they announced to Becket
the fact of their appeal and the date assigned for it, Ascension Day
in the following year.1 The letter was entrusted to Ralph, who
was, besides his personal qualifications, archdeacon to Foliot, who
drew up the letter. The king had been abroad since the preceding
March, and Ralph was no doubt instructed to maintain a direct
communication with the court. The letter was one of spirited and
urgent but still temperate remonstrance : the suffragans prayed
their chief to exhibit the prudence, humility, and pastoral careful-
ness which are the greatest virtues of a prelate. The king, he was
told, was ready to do justice, and, in all points of dispute between
himself and the archbishop, to abide by the judgment of the Church
of England. The archdeacon delivered the letter, but whether at
Pontigny, where Becket seems to have resided for some weeks after
the excommunications, or at 8. Colombo at Sens, whither he
removed after the king in September had urged the Cistercian
chapter to force him away from Pontigny, we cannot determine.
The archbishop returned an answer which is at once scornful,
argumentative, and sanctimonious.2 The reference which it con-
tains to the bearer of the letter of the suffragans is slight enough ;
but Ralph seems to be treated to a full share of the contempt that
Becket so liberally bestowed on his opponents : ' from your letters
which I have received through your archdeacon I have gathered
thus much, for I could not expect to gather grapes of thorns or figs
of thistles.' 3 The archdeacon does not seem to have prided himself
on the reception he met with, for in his abridgment of the primate's
answer he omits all reference to himself as conducting the negotia-
tion. John of Salisbury, in a letter to Bishop Bartholomew of
Exeter, mentions him as bearing an epistle from the king to Foliot,
in which Henry committed himself, his whole kingdom and his
cause, to the bishop of London as his most faithful friend, and
ordered his officials to obey him in all things.4 This letter seems to

1 The letter is given more fully in
Hoveden, i. 262; 8. T. C. vi. 186.
It is identified as the letter described
by John of Salisbury in his epistle
184, by the extracts which he gives.

2 Hoveden, i. 256 ; S. T. C. iii. 283.
1 ' Sed de Htteris tuis, quas per

archidiaconum tuum destinatas accepi,
talia collegi ; neque enim de spinia
uvas aut ficus de tribulis colligere

potui.' S. T. C. iii. 283.

4 ' Scripsit ei nuper dominus rex
per Radulfum Dicetensem archidia-
conum Huuin, quod se, totum regnum
suum, et causam quee inter eum et
ecclesism vertitur, ipsius, tanquam
patris et fidelissimi amici, committit
arbitrio, et prsecepit ut sui officiates ei
in omnibus usquequaque obediant.'
Joh. Salisb., Ep. 184.

MASTER RALPH DE DICETO 61

prove, if it were necessary, that Ralph de Diceto was the archdeacon
who carried the letter to Becket, and that he had returned by the
way of the royal court. He does not appear again in these negotia-
tions, but his relations with Foliot gave him the opportunity of
learning all that took place ; he watched them with care, and
although his ' Imagines ' were probably not put in their present form
until several years after the events, and thus his descriptions have
none of the exactness and vividness that might have been expected
if they had been written whilst the recollection was fresh, they are,
coming from the hand of a careful and by no means partial eye-
witness, an invaluable addition to the letters and lives of Saint
Thomas of Canterbury.

One or two notes of Bishop Foliot's movements during the Business of
remaining years of the controversy occur in the ' Imagines,' and show absolution
that Ralph, if not in his company, received exact information from
him. In the spring of 1169 Foliot was in anticipation of an
immediate sentence of anathema to be directed against himself by
name. The king had received a letter from Alexander III., dated in
the preceding June,1 and telling him that the archbishop was no
longer forbidden to excommunicate; there was no doubt that the
bishop of London would be the first object of attack, and accordingly
on the 18th of March he called together the clergy and people of His solemn
London at S. Paul's and solemnly appealed to the Pope.2 The
appeal did not stay the sentence, which Becket pronounced on Palm
Sunday at Clairvaux. At Michaelmas Foliot started for Rome to His journey
prosecute his appeal. In dread of treachery he chose the longer
route, and instead of proceeding through Burgundy, the ordinary
road followed as of old by English travellers, he went through
Guienne and Provence and across the Alps to Milan.3 He reached
Milan in the spring of 1170, and there he received letters dated
February 14th, in which the Pope told him that he had directed the
archbishop of Rouen and the bishop of Exeter to absolve him.4
Cheered by the news he returned at full speed to the north, and His return

* •*• and absolu-

reached Rouen in time to be absolved on Palm Sunday, March 29. tion
Most of these dates are recorded in the ' Imagines,' and this might
lead us to suppose that the author went with the bishop ; but we
find from the letters of Master David, a canon of S. Paul's, whose
literary remains were a few years ago published in the Spicilegium
Liberianum,s that Foliot had employed other officers in his negotiation

1 S. T. C. iv. 130. 5 ' Quiete et prospere ad Sanctum

' S. T. C. vi. 218 ; R. Diceto, i. Ambrosium devenientes,' Spicileg.

333. Liberian. p. 644. Compare the words

3 Job. Salisb., Ep. 293 ; Spicilegium of Ralph, vol. i. p. 337 R. S. ed. :

Liberianum, p. 642. ' veniens ad Sanctum Ambrosium.'

« Vol. i. p. 337 R. S. ed. S.T.C. iv. 93.

62

THE HISTORICAL WORKS OF

Coronation
of the
younger
king, and
murder of
Becket

Follot
absolved
from his
guilt in the
coronation

Restored to
bis episcopal
functions

with the Pope. David had himself been one of the messengers.
In a letter addressed to him, bidding him wait at Rouen, the bishop
announces his arrival at Milan in nearly the same words as those
used in the ' Imagines,' and states that the king had communicated
with him through Nicolas, the archdeacon of London.1 This being
the case, it seems more probable that Ralph was left at home to
manage the diocese, and that his precise details of the bishop's
movements were derived from similar letters addressed to himself.

The security obtained for Foliot by the absolution was destined
to be short lived. In the following June the coronation of the
younger Henry involved him in new difficulties. One of Becket's
first acts on his return was to declare the bishop of London ex-
communicate under papal letters ; and his refusal to withdraw the
sentence except on terms of abject submission was one of the points
of his altercation with his murderers. The murder of Becket left
the hostile bishops in greater danger than they had ever been before,
but the Pope was not implacable. The sentence of anathema issued
on account of his participation in the coronation was withdrawn,
and the bishop, on undertaking to abide by the Pope's judgment,
was absolved from that part of his guilt by the bishops of Nevers
and Beauvais, at Chaumont, near Gisors, in August 117 1.2 But he
was not yet restored to the exercise of his episcopal functions ; before
that could be done he had to purge himself of all complicity in the
death of Becket. He was not disposed to take another journey to
Rome, and, alleging ill-health as a cause, sent one of his archdeacons
and two clerks, named Richard and Hugh, to perform the ceremony
as his representatives.3 That done, the Pope wrote on the 27th of
February 1172 to the archbishop of Rouen, giving him leave to
receive the bishop's personal purgation and to rehabilitate him ; and
this was done on the 1st of May at Aumale.4 In this negotiation
we are again tempted to trace the hand of Ralph. The archdeacon
who was employed is denoted by the initial ' R.' ; but as it is probable
that both Richard Foliot, archdeacon of Colchester, and Robert
Banastre, archdeacon of Essex, were studying at the time at Bologna,

1 Spicileg. Liberian. p. 644.

2 The papal letters were directed
to the archbishop of Bourges and the
bishop of Nevers, April 24, S. T. C.
vi. 59 ; Bened. i. 23. The bishops of
Nevers and Beauvais and the abbot
of Pontigny performed the absolution.

1 The Pope writes from Tusculum,
Feb. 27, 1172: 'Sane cum nulli
apparuissent qui vellent eos impetere,
et prtedictus Londoniensis, obstante
sibi debilitate corporis, ad tantum

laborem suscipiendum non cssct suffi-
ciens, et in via plurima discrimina et
pericula imminerent, dilectos filios
nostros R. archidiaconum suum et
magistrum Ricardum et magistrum
Hugonem clericos ejus ad presentiam
nostram transmisit, ut pro se coram
nobis purgationem pnestarent.' 8. T.
C. iv. 68.

4 The archbishop of Rouen and the
bishop of Amiens officiated.

MASTER RALPH DE DICETO

63

one of these was more probably the bishop's agent on the occasion.
Master David also was again employed. With the restitution at
Aumale Foliot's troubles ceased, and the remaining years of his
episcopate were peaceful.

For several years we have no data that would enable us to trace
our author's occupation, except one or two matters of archidiaconal acts of
business in which a glimpse of him may be caught. In the
Chronicle of Walden Abbey we find him authorising the exemption
of the chapel which the Earl of Essex had built at Pleshey from
the jurisdiction of the archdeacon and his officials.1 On another
occasion he appears more jealous of his official rights ; a letter of
Foliot's exhibits him struggling for his rightful jurisdiction over the
church of S. Margaret, Westminster, in opposition to Abbot
Laurence.2 The church of Buhner, in Essex, was the subject of
another dispute between Walter of Buhner, a clerk, and Ealph de
Hauterive, a canon of S. Paul's, master of the schools, and afterwards
archdeacon. In this Ealph had an interest, and joined in an agree-
ment referring it to the bishop for arbitration on the 4th of December
1178.3 If we attempt to trace him in public affairs during the same

1 MS. Arundel 29, fo. 6 ; Fundatio
Walden. lib. ii. c. 3 : ' Praeter haec
concessimus ut capella cum cimiterio
apud Plessetum, quam ipse ffidifi-
caverat, dedicaretur, quia longe erat
ecclesia matrix de Estra, dimcilis
vero et longa, maxime tempore hye-
mali corpora mortuorum ad sepelien-
dum ferentibus, via. Remansit autem
ad servitium ejusdem capellse tota
decimatio cum obventionibus habi-
tantium in Plesseto cum decima
insuper duarum virgatarum de Bere-
wik Grancise videlicet Plesseto
propinquioris, qua ad ecclesiam de
Estra usque ad ilium tempus per-
tinebat. In dedicatione autem ilia,
multis coram astantibus, episcopo
insuper Gileberto ordinante, Radulfo
etiam de Disceto archidiacono Middle-
sexiae assensum prsebente, statutum
est ut capella jam dicta omnino sit
libera, neque archidiacono, neque ejus
officialibus teneatur respondere :
crisma autem ad baptismum et oleum
iufirmorum de matrice ecclesia, Estra
scilicet, accipere ei concessum est.'
See also Newcourt, Rep. Lond. i. 34.

9 'Ecclesiam quippe Sanctse Mar-
garet®, super qua recens hsec est orta
dissensio, a primis suis fundamentis
usque ad dies hos episcopis London-
iensibus et eorum archidiaconis sine

contradictione et reclamatione fuisse
subjectam, consonum totius undique
vicinise testimonium clamet ; et hanc
meo quoque tempore R. archidiacono
debitum et consuetum cathedraticum
exsolvisse in illis fere partibus nullus
ignorat.' S. T. C. v. 363. Laurence
was abbot 1160-1176.

3 ' Composition or award made by
Gilbert bishop of London in the
presence of Robert bishop of Hereford,
in 1178, for settlement of the con-
troversy between the churches of
Bulemere and Brandon, moved against
Ralph de Hauterive by Walter de
Bulemere, clerk, and his accomplices,
and referred to the said bishop by
common consent of all claiming rights
in the said church of Bulemere, viz.
Ralph de Disceto, archdeacon of
London ; Gilbert Geldham, dean ;
and the aforesaid Walter ; and also
John Le Manant, knight, patron of
the church of Brundone, and the said
Ralph de Hauterive, the parson of the
said church. At S. Paul's, London, 4
non. Dec. Witnesses, Robert, bishop of
Hereford ; Hugh, dean of S. Paul's ;
Richard, archdeacon of Colchester ;
Henry of Northampton, Richard
Stortford, Gilbert Foliot, canons of
S. Paul's ; Ralph Foliot, canon of
Hereford; Roger FitzMaurice, and

64

THE HISTORICAL WORKS OF

His silence
•boat him-
self

Account of

Master

David

David at

period, it is only by following the proceedings of Foliot or observing
the occasions on which, like any other archdeacon, he would be
summoned to ecclesiastical assemblies. Possibly he witnessed the
election and consecration of the bishops when he records the dates
and circumstances of the ceremony. He was no doubt present when
Archbishop Richard visited S. Paul's on the 24th of October 1174 ;
probably he attended the court in 1177, when many deans and arch-
deacons were summoned to hear the award between the kings of
Castile and Navarre, of which he preserves an imperfect record.1
But he tells us nothing about himself ; his omission to notice the
great disturbances which took place in London in 11772 indicates
either that he was absent or that he wrote after the importance of
the matter was forgotten. In this obscurity the career of Master
David affords a ray of light, and shows us that nearly thirty years
after his first appointment at 8. Paul's his position was not so secure
as might have been expected.

Master David, whom we have seen employed as Foliot's envoy3
on two occasions in Italy, was an ambitious and a needy man. He
called himself David of London, and was perhaps prebendary of
Brownswood.4 He had studied with profit at Clermont, at Paris,
and at Bologna. On one occasion we find him applying to Dean
Hugh and the Chapter for leave of non-residence.5 Foliot, who
seems to have been his first patron, had a high opinion of his
character and attainments,6 and he was on very friendly terms with
Robert Foliot, the bishop of Hereford, a kinsman of Gilbert, and
with Roger, the bishop of Worcester, the king's cousin. He was
resident at Bologna when the two archdeacons were reading there,7
and acted in the business of his patron's absolution both in 1169 and
in 1171. At Bologna apparently he got into debt, and, in trying to
extricate himself, showed himself ungrateful and greedy. After a
long series of self-commendatory begging letters, he went to seek

others.' Charters of the duchy of
Lancaster, 35, Report of the Deputy
Keeper, App. p. 29. Bulmere is in
Essex, but in the old archdeaconry of
Middlesex. Newcourt, ii. 99, 103.

1 R. de Die. i. 418; Benedict, i.
145 : ' Venerun t etiara illuc tot abbates,
tot decani, tot archidiaconi quot sub
numero non cadebant.'

2 Benedict, i. 165. Another reason
for omitting to mention these trans-
actions may have been that the
Bucquints, who were implicated in
them, were tenants of the chapter of
8. Paul's. Humfrey Buccuinte was
farmer of Kensworth. (MS. Button,
6956, p. 158.)

1 Above, pp. 61, 63. Compare
8. T. C. iv. 62, 94.

4 If he was either, Newcourt has
confounded him with another person
called Brand, or his name was
David Brand. See Newcourt's list of
the prebendaries of Brownswood.
Archdeacon Hale (Domesday, AC..
p. cxviii) seems to doubt whether he
was a canon : anyhow he bad a
demesne at Willesdon ; ib. p. 152.

* Spicileg. Liberian. pp. 603-606.

• 8. T. C. vi. 34.

' Spicil. Lib. p. 610, 'Adventunti-
bus Boloniam dominis meis archidia-
cono et nepotibus domini mei laetus
factus sum.' Cf. 8. T C. iv. 68.

MASTER RALPH DE DICETO

65

the deanery

his fortune at Rome. Foliot had done for him what he could, and
had perhaps held out the hopes of succession to an archdeaconry
when one should be vacant. He had certainly assigned him a
pension of ten pounds on the archdeaconry of Middlesex, and for
more than two years Ralph de Diceto, as archdeacon, had continued
to pay it. Then he quarrelled with his friends. The dean Hugh
was an old man, and a vacancy might be expected any day in the
chief dignity of the church.1 For that dignity there can be little He aims at
question that Ralph de Diceto had long been marked out ; it was an
elective office, and he had been for nearly thirty years a member of
the chapter ; he was the depository of all the traditions of the
church, and no doubt had much personal influence, if not also, as
might be suspected, a family influence in the cathedral body. The
news that Master David, fortified with letters from the bishops of
Hereford and Worcester,2 was on his way to Rome to secure the opposition
papal nomination to the deanery, may well have disgusted both the bishop
bishop and archdeacon. Ralph stopped Master David's pension,
and the bishop wrote letters to oppose him. This proceeding seems

1 Foliot writes to the bishop of
Worcester : ' Anna sumit adversum
nos familiaris vir et quondam domes-
ticus noster, magister ille David, et
quern laudum titulis extulimus, quern
beneficiis honoravimus, quern spera-
bamus amicissmum, non solum ex-
perimur ingratum sed etiam infestis-
simum. Hie cupidse mentis injecit
oculos in praecipuam ecclesias nostraa
dignitatem, et ut earn nobis invitis
obtineat ad dominum papam iter
parat, ut ejus auctoritate nos laedat et
ipsum circumveniendo, quod nostri
juris est non violenter solum sed im-
pudenter extorqueat.' He had applied
for letters to the bishops of Worcester
and Hereford. Spicil. Liber, p. 641.

2 The bishop of Worcester writes
thus to the Pope : Master David of
London is a devout, faithful, and
learned man ; the bishop of London,
' considerata mediocritate immo parvi-
tate redditus sui, et viri honestate et
litteratura, ei decem libras argenti in
archidiaconatu Middelsexiae annuatim
percipiendas assignavit, donee eidem
in pari vel ampliori beneficio eccle-
siastico provideatur ; quod et carta sua
quam inspeximus confirmavit, et lit-
teris a sigillo dependentibus, ut memo-
rato magistro David solveret prsefatas
libras decem, R. archidiacono Middel-
sexiensi prsecepit. Qui de mandate ei

per biennium continuum et infra ter-
minis statutis persolvit. Ortis autem
quibusdam controversiis inter jam
dictos, episcopum et archidiaconum et
magistrum David, episcopus et archi-
diaconus arbitrium commutaverunt, ut
quod archidiaconus in magistro David
solvere consuevit deinde episcopo
persolveret.' The archdeacon had
accordingly stopped payment. Now,
however, the bishop had restored
David to his favour, but as his pecu-
niary position was precarious, the
bishop of Worcester prays the Pope to
order Foliot to assign him ten pounds
a year from the first vacant benefice :
' interim vero, donee vacaverit bene-
ficium in quo sufficienter decem librae
ei recompensentur, districte prsacipiatis
praedicto archidiacono, ut illas de
archidiaconatu in quo ei constat fuisse
assignatas, absque vexationis molestia
persolvat. In hujus ergo interventus
pro viro digno exhibiti exauditione,
experiatur nostras parvitatis devotio,
pater reverende, consuetas benignitatis
affectum ; et ne tanti viri labores
alicujus tergiversatione deludantur, in
severitate et districtione mandati
praecipiatis prronominato archidiacono,
ut decem libras quas magistro David
solvere consuevit, occasione et ap-
pellatione cessante integre persolvat.'
Spicil. Liber, pp. 757, 758.

66

THE HISTORICAL WORKS OF

Balph be-
comes dean
of 8. Paul's

Ralph's
early friends
promoted
before him

Remaining
friends in
the chapter

to have nipped Master David's ambition in the bud. The last we
hear of him is in a letter from the bishop of Worcester to the
Pope, praying that, now that Bishop Foliot has admitted him again
to favour, the archdeacon may be ordered to resume payment of
the pension until David could be provided with a benefice of the
same value. This correspondence must have taken place before
1179, in which year Bishop Roger died. In 1180 the deanery was
vacated and Ralph de Diceto was elected to fill it.

Although as a rule promotion was slow except for servants of
the Court, Ralph de Diceto must have seen himself outstripped in
the race for preferment by many who had started with him.
Thomas Becket, his junior probably in the capitular body, had long
ago reached the honours not only of the primacy but of martyrdom
and canonisation. John of Canterbury, his competitor for the arch-
deaconry, had been for nearly twenty years a bishop, and was shortly
to be chosen to fill the half -independent see of Lyons. Richard of
Ilchester, his friend, had become in 1174 bishop of Winchester, and
Robert Foliot, archdeacon of Oxford, with whom he had been
long associated under Bishop Gilbert, had become the same year
bishop of Hereford. Of his Parisian acquaintance, Robert of Melun
had been made a bishop in 1168 ; and Adam, the canon of Notre
Dame, who had been associated also with John of Salisbury, had
been, in 1175, promoted to the see of S. Asaph. A new generation
and school was springing up around him in his own cathedral, but
there were still with him William de Vere, the early friend and
fellow-student ; William of Northall, the archdeacon of Gloucester
and residentiary of S. Paul's ; Paris, the archdeacon of Rochester,
nephew of the great Robert Pullus, and himself closely associated
with the Sicilian clergy ; some remnants of the Belmeis family
party, and more than one Foliot. It is not impossible that Ralph
during some portion of his career acted as Master of the Schools of
S. Paul's, in that office which later bore the name of chancellor.
Between Master Henry, who in the time of Richard of Belmeis had
contended for the archdeaconry of Colchester, and Ralph de Haute-
rive, the military archdeacon who led the English reserve at the
siege of Acre, there is abundant room for another ' magister.' But
whether or no Ralph filled the office, he must have exercised over
the resident body of younger canons an enlightened and beneficial
influence. The election to the deanery was a free election.1 No
cong6 d'elire from the bishop was requisite, and although the
episcopal confirmation after the election was necessary, there could
be no question about the ratification of the election in the case of

Statutes of S. Paul's (ed. Simpson), p. 14.

MASTER RALPH DE DICETO 67

so old and tried a servant. Ralph does not note either the Date of his
death of his predecessor or his own appointment. The exact date,
then, is not ascertained, but as we find him at work on the
survey of the chapter property as early as January 8th, 1181, it is
clear that he must have been settled in his office before the end
of 1180.

It is not easy under the altered circumstances of the modern importance
cathedral system to realise the importance of such a position as that position
to which Ealph was now called. The High Dean of S. Paul's ! was
not only the head of a great body of rich and active clergy, but the
chief administrator of a very large estate in land, one of the chief
citizens of the capital city of England, and the foremost secular
priest in the southern province. He was the dean of London,
' decanus Lundoniensis,' for he did not, except in official documents,
call himself dean of S. Paul's, or admit the dean of S. Martin's, his
near neighbour, to any superficial parity of dignity. Ralph brought
long experience and a strong love of his church to his new office, and
he left on the administrative history of his cathedral a deep and
lasting mark. His historical labours were by no means the whole
of his work ; his reputation as a theologian was considerable, and
the scriptorium of S. Paul's produced postills, as well as chronicles
and compilations, of which he was the author ; but his hand is as
distinctly traceable in the register, the survey, and in the statute
book ; the same strikingly beautiful penmanship, the Pauline hand,
as I shall venture to call it, which under his superintendence recorded
the great events of history, may be recognised among the extant
muniments of his cathedral.

We are prone, in examining into the municipal and mercantile Ecciesiasti-
history of London, to forget that it was a very great ecclesiastical of London*8
centre. The fact that the cathedral of Canterbury was in the hands
of a monastic chapter left S. Paul's at the head of the secular clergy
of southern England ; it was an educational centre too, where young
statesmen spent their leisure in something like self-culture. London
with its 40,000 inhabitants had a hundred and twenty churches, all
looking to the cathedral as their mother.2 The resident canons had
to exercise a magnificent hospitality carefully prescribed in ancient
statutes ; twice a year each of them had to entertain the whole staff
of the cathedral, and to invite the bishop, the mayor, the sheriffs,
aldermen, justices and great men of the court.3 Rich as the church
was, no canon was allowed to become residentiary who could not

1 ' Rauf de Disze le haut den de Report of Cathedral Comm., App. p. 2.

Lundres,' ' Livere des reis,' p. 256. '* Pet. Bles. epistt. (ed. Giles), ii. 85.

The dean of Rouen cathedral also 3 Statutes, pp. 125, 126.
bore the title of ' haut doyen.' 1st

68

THE HISTORICAL WORKS OF

The survey
of the
estates of
the chapter

Extant frag-
ment of the
surrey

Title of the
survey

afford to spend seven or eight hundred marks the first year : at York
the qualification was not less than a thousand marks.1 If this were
the case with the canons, the obligation lay more heavily and con-
tinuously on the dean. Ralph's first thought seems to have been
how to become a good husband to his church.

The first act which he undertook as dean was the great survey of
the lands and churches belonging to the chapter of his cathedral.2
It was an exact account, drawn up in a most orderly manner, like
the Domesday survey of the Conqueror, or the great Durham survey
of ' Boldon Buke.' A precious fragment of the original is preserved
in the Bodleian Library (MS. Bawlinson, B. 872), and has been
edited with notes and large illustrative apparatus by the late Arch-
deacon Hale among the publications of the Camden Society. The
penmanship of the fragment exactly resembles that of the original
manuscripts of the dean's historical works, and would afford a proof,
if such proof were wanted, that might suffice for their identification.
Although his survey is comparatively well known to antiquaries
through Dugdale and Newcourt, as well as through Archdeacon
Hale's ' Domesday of S. Paul's,' it forms too important a part of our
author's history to be left with a scanty notice here.

The title and date of the document, which are important as
fixing the time of Ralph's appointment to the deanery, run as
follows :

' Annus ab Incarnatione Domini millesimus centesimus octogesi-
mus primus. Annus pontificatus Alexandri papae tertii vicesimus
primus. Annus regni regis Anglorum Henrici secundi vicesimus
Septimus* Annus regni regis Anglorum Henrici filii regis undecimus.
Annus translationis episcopi Herefordensis Gilberti Folioth in
Lundoniensem episcopum octavus decimus tune temporis effluebat,
quando facta fuit inquisitio maneriorum 3 beati Pauli per Radulfum
de Diceto decanum Lundoniensem ; anno primo sui decanatus,
assistentibus ei tarn magistro Henrico de Norhamtona quam domino
Roberto de Cliforde.' 4 The regnal years are not exact, for the 21st
year of Alexander III. ended in September 1180, whilst the 27th
year of Henry II. began on the 19th of the following December. As,

1 First Report of the Cathedral
Commissioners, Appendix i. p. 17.
Bishop Braybrook in 1399 fixed the
more reasonable sum of 300 marks,
Statutes of S. Paul's, p. 152.

1 It does not contain a survey of
the prebendal estates, only of the
chapter lands, the ' communa,' and
churches.

' ' The manors forming the com-
muna of the chapter were Caddington,

Kensworth, Sandon, Luffenhale, Ard-
leigh, in Hertfordshire ; Beauchamp,
Wickham, Thorpe and Kirkby, and
Walton, Tidwolditun, Tillingham,
Barling, Runwell, Norton, Navestock,
and Chingford, in Essex ; Button and
Drayton in Middlesex ; and Barnes in
Surrey.' Simpson, Statutes, pref. p.
xxvii.

4 Hale, Domesday of 3. Paul's, pp.
112, sg- ; Dugdale, S. Paul's, p. 306.

MASTER RALPH DE DICETO 69

however, Alexander died on August 80, 1181, the survey must have
been thrown into its present form in the January of that year.

The Inquest on which the survey is based lasted twenty-two days, Journal of
beginning at Caddington, in Hertfordshire, on January 8, and ending on which

at Sutton, in Middlesex, on the 80th. The articles of inquiry are
stated in the distinct and cautious order that marks the rest of
Ralph's work : ' ut facilius veritas erueretur, pro maneriorum capaci-
tate, pro numero colonorum modo plures modo pauciores eligendos
decrevimus artatos praestita juris jurandi religione, quod ad interro-
gata nee verum supprimerent nee assererent falsum scienter, sed
juxta conscientiam suam in commune proferrent pro quot hydis
unaquaeque villa se defenderet tempore regis Henrici, tempore
Willelmi decani, versus regem, quid tune fiscalibus commodis
appenderetur per annum vicecomiti scilicet vel hundredi praeposito,
quidve modo ; quid modo solvatur collegio canonicorum, quot hydse
in dominio, quot assisae, quot liberae, quot geldabiles, quot in dominio
eint arabiles acrae, quot in prato, quot in nemore sive vestito sive non
vestito ; quid instauramenti possit apponi vel in marisco vel in alia
pastura ; qui colonorum libertate gauderent quive gravarentur
operibus, qui censuales, quive cottarii ; quid meliorationis accreverit
in unoquoque manerio, quidve manerium senserit detrimentum vel
in deterioratione domorum vel in vastatione nemorum ; quis
terminos moverit vel praeterierit. Quia vero pravorum intentio
semper est prior ad detrahendum, si lector de reprehensione sollicitus
circa maneriorum inquisitionem aliquid omissum notaverit, non
id inquirentium negligent!® deputet sed juratorum vel errori vel
fraudi.'

Apart from the social and economical value of the survey,
matters which cannot be touched on now, it has considerable interest
in pointing out to us the sort of men with whom Ralph de Diceto
was associated in the management of the estates and business of his
church. Of the farmers of the seventeen manors visited by the dean
and his assessors, five were canons of the cathedral or high
dignitaries elsewhere. The first, who farmed Caddington and Kens- Farmers of
worth, was Herbert, archdeacon of Canterbury, the son of Richard estates'1 "
of Ilchester, bishop of Winchester, and himself afterwards bishop of
Salisbury.1 Ardleigh was farmed by Nicolas de Sigillo, archdeacon
of Huntingdon and clerk of the Exchequer, probably a son or brother
of Bishop Robert de Sigillo, who had one son at least in the chapter.2
Richard Ruffus, the prebendary of Twyford, farmed Sandon,
Eadulfsnase, Barling, and Runwell and Belchamp : the lease of

1 Domesd. of S. Paul's, p. 110. son of Bishop Robert, was prebendary

2 Domesd. of S. Paul's, p. Ill of Mora. (Newcourt.)
Madox, Hist. Exch. p. 485. Henry,

70 THE HISTORICAL WORKS OF

some of which had been granted to a predecessor of the same name
who was archdeacon of Essex ; Richard was a great man in his way,
and possessed a house of his own within the cathedral precincts.
William of Northall, who farmed Drayton, was archdeacon of
Gloucester and afterwards bishop of Worcester; and Nicolas, the
archdeacon of London, held Button. John de Marigni or Marney
farmed Navestock, probably by favour of Dean Hugh de Marigni ;
Robert of Fulham held Wickham, Gilbertus Manens held Tit-
wolditon, William and Theodoric, two brothers, held Tillingham,
and Odo of Dammartin held Norton ; Walter and John held Barnes.
Of these seven we have only the names.1

survey of The survey of the manors a was followed by a visitation of the

bdonrfns to churches, a complete abstract or transcript of which, as well as of

the survey, is preserved among the cathedral registers.3 The report

of the visitation is introduced by an instructive and characteristic

preface, addressed by the dean, perhaps, to his successors :—

' Patrimonium beati Pauli doctoris gentium in ecclesia Londo-
niensi liberalitate regum, oblatione fidelium, canonicis ibidem Deo
servientibus collatum antiquitus, ordine quo supra descriptum est
cum de maneriis ageretur. Si volueris diligentius perscrutari per
ordinem vires locorum occultatas hucusque, non poteris amodo
causari tibi prorsus incognitas. Ad communem igitur utilitatem
respiciens, si primam vocem habueris in capitulo, si vel fueris
ascriptus in matricula canonicorum, nulla ratione sustineas ut si
firmarionim potestas, qui modo possident, exspiraverit, quoquo casu,
quod aliquis vel canonicus vel extraneus simul ad firmam possideat
et manerium et ecclesiam ; sed ne promiscuis actibus rerum tur-
bentur officia, sit semper in eadem villa distinctio personarum ; sit
alter qui temporalibus prsesit, sit alter qui spiritualia subministret :
sit alius qui decimas solvat, sit alius qui recipiat. Ordinetur autem
vicarius in ecclesiis juxta dispositionem capituli, qui, si facilitates
ecclesi® patiantur, dum servit altari sit contentus altnrio ; si non
patiantur, victus capellano suppleatur ex decimis ad arbitrium tale
quod semper honestati sit conscium. Reliqui vero fructus, quos in
ecclesia propriis sumptibus excoluerit, majores quoque decimaa
reserventur canonicis vel ad annuum censum capellanis vel aliis
clericis tradantur ad firmam. De regulari jure faciendum est quod
supradiximus, nisi necessitas urgens interdum aliud aliquid fieri pro
ratione temporis et utilitate magna capituli flagitaverit. Ordinetur
autem vicarius in ecclesiis juxta dispositionem tarn decani quam
capituli. Qua sit ergo dos ecclesiarum, quid solvatur capitulo, quid
per clericos, quidve per firmarium ecclesiae nomine ; quid in aliquibus

1 Domesday of 8. Paul's, p. 111. * Ibid. p. 140.

" Ibid. pp. 146-152.

MASTEE RALPH DE DICETO 71

locis ecclesise matrici jure parochial! solvatur, a qua noster firmarius,
a qua nostri colon! recipiant spiritualia ; quid solvatur pro sinoda-
libus, quis colligat beat! Petri denarium ; quid solvatur archidiaconis
Huntedoniaa vel Bedefordiae, quis ecclesiarum ornatus, diligenter
annexum invenies in sequentibus. Explicit prologus.' l

Of the character of the visitation, the report on Navestock may Report on

, -n -i . -i HT i i'-i-' • Navestock

serve as a specimen : — ' Ecclesia de Nastocha est in dominio canom-
corum et reddit eis Ix. solidos per manum firmarii ; et solvit nomine
sinodalium xii. d. ; de denario beati Petri iii. solidos quos colligit
sacerdos et solvit. Et habet in dominio de terra arabili xlvii. acras,
in bosco xl. acras, et defendit eas versus regem pro quater viginti
acris. Habet etiam decimas plenas totius villae et de dominio tertiam
garbam.' The case of Navestock might be a good illustration of the
wisdom of the dean's suggestion that the farm of the manor and the
rectory should not be in the same hands. S. Paul's held the two
together until the Keformation, when the two were finally divided ;
but long before that, probably, the eighty acres of glebe and wood
which belonged to the church had been lost among the lands of the
manor ; the vicar holds now about twenty acres, and the rectors
possess no land in the parish. The whole record of survey and
visitation throws light on the temporal and spiritual administration
of church property which is very valuable ; the use of the inquest
by sworn recognitors for the valuation of the land ; the confusion of
lay and clerical duties in the hands of the great men of the chapter ;
the institution of vicarages often very scantily endowed on the rich
manors, intended to exonerate the great clerks from the duty of
serving their churches, are all significant points. The period was
one at which the appropriation of tithes was very largely extended,
and at which the claims of the ministering priest of the parish were
universally set aside in favour of those of the beneficed parson, who
might on those terms hold any number of livings and be scarcely,
even in name, a clerk. Ealph, who held Aynho and Finchingfield
in this loose way, did not scruple to throw the cure of the parishes
on the newly instituted vicarages ; it is to his credit that he tried to
obtain for them a sufficient endowment.

Ealph's first act as dean of S. Paul's was the beginning of a long Documents
and careful administration of the property of his church. In 1447 2 Ralph de
the chapter still possessed three registers bearing the name of Ealph j^*0 ''
de Diceto ; time, however, has not spared us one that answers to the
character of a decanal register. But the general registers of the
cathedral and the muniment room of the chapter still contain, either
in original charters or in early copies, a large number of documents

1 Domesday of S. Paul's, pp. 146, 147. " Domesday of S. Paul's, p. xvi.

72

THE HISTORICAL WORKS OF

Chapter acts
executed by
Ralph de
Diceto as

dean

drawn up and sealed by him. Many of these have been used by
Newcourt, who employed them with pious zeal in the composition of
his Bepertorium Ecclesiasticum Parochiale Londinense ; and the
antiquarian industry of Dr. Matthew Hutton prompted him to
extract from the mass some of the most important of the Pauline
records, the abstract of which is preserved among the Harleian
Manuscripts. But many more still lie unnoted on the registers and
in the charter drawers, full of interest for the history of London and
the church, but far too numerous and various to be even cited in this
place. Many of these are in the form of leases granted to the farmers
of the chapter lands, and form a valuable continuation to the series
of earlier leases printed by Archdeacon Hale from a still earlier
register, in the Domesday of S. Paul's. Thus there is a lease of
Norton to John of Dammartin, granted no doubt on the death or
termination of the tenure of Odo of Dammartin,1 a lease of Sandon
to Thomas and Alan of Bassingburn,2 and a lease of Belchamp,
dated in 1185, to Richard Buffus.3 Others record the presentation
to churches : Ralph de Diceto and the chapter grant the church of
Ardleigh to John of Winchester, and again to Hamo of Winchester ; 4
they receive Master Gilbert of Cranford as clerk to the chapel of
East Twyford on the presentation of Payn FitzHenry ; * the church
of Barnes is granted to Richard, a kinsman of Henry of Northampton,
at a rent of half a mark ; but this is probably a lease of tithes to be
supplemented by the institution of a vicar.6 Some of the grants
are of the nature of monastic endowments, bestowed perhaps with a
view of increasing the influence of the chapter. It was probably
under the influence of the Justiciar Ranulf Glanvill that the church
of S. Olave, Jewry, and two-thirds of S. Stephen's, Coleman Street,

1 MS. Hutton, p. 27. « Sciant
praesentcs et futuri quod ego Radulfus
de Diceto decanus ecclesiae Sancti
Pauli Lumlonife et ejusdem capitulum
concessimus Johanni de Dammartin
Nortonam cum omnibus pertinentiis
suis tenendam de nobis ad firmani
. . . reddentes inde nobis annuatim
centum solidos. Testibns Radulfo de
Diceto decano, Nicholao archidiacono,
Henrico thesaurario, Ricardo de Stor-
teforde magistro scholarum, magistro
Henrico, Roberto de Clifforde, Hugone
de Raculie, Henrico filio episcopi,
magistro Hugone, Ricardo Juveni,
Rad. de Chiltona, Gileberto Banastre.'
See Newcourt, ii. 439.

1 Button MS., p. 122.

1 Hutton MS., part 2, p. 117.

4 Hutton MS., pp. 68, 87.

* Newcourt, i. 769 ; Hutton MS.,

p. 53.

• Hutton MS., p. 48. ' Sciant
omncs quod ego R. de Diceto, decanus
ecclesiae Sancti Pauli Lundonue, et
ejusdem ecclesiae capitulum concessi-
mus Ricardo cognato magistri Henrioi
de Norhamtune ecclesiam de Berne
cum terris et decimis et obventionibus
et omnibus rectitudinibus ad eandem
pertinentibns ; reddet autem inde
nobis annuatim dimidiam marcam.
Hanc vero concessionem ipsi facimus
salvo jure universo quod dominus
archiepiscopus Cantuariensis habet in
ecclesia ilia. Testibus Rad. decano,
Nio. archid. Lundon., magistro Ri-
cardo, magistro Radulfo, Hugone de
Raculf, Roberto de Clifforde, magistro
Henrico, magistro Hugone, Ricardo
juniore, magistro Ricardo fratre
Nicholai et Ricardi.'

MASTEB EALPH DE DICETO 73

were granted or secured to the monastery of Butley, of which he was
the founder. In this case the prior and convent were to act as
vicars of S. Olave's and supply the pastoral care : a clumsy arrange-
ment which was afterwards superseded by a formal appropriation
and the ordination of a vicarage.1 There is also a grant of land at
Ludeburn to the prior and convent of Merton in Surrey.2 A more
interesting series of documents are the grants of land, houses, and
other property, with which the resources of the church were enlarged
during the same period. And amongst these Ealph himself deserves Ralph's
the first place, both as a benefactor and as a promoter of good works to his ° '
in others. He built himself a deanery-house and chapel within the c
precincts of S. Paul's, which when completed he bestowed with the
land on which they stood, and the ornaments and books with which
he had furnished them, on the deans his successors for ever. For
the securing of this benefaction he obtained letters of confirmation
from Gilbert Foliot and Richard FitzNeal, successively bishops of
London, from Richard archbishop of Canterbury, and Pope Lucius III.
This must have been done soon after he became dean, as Archbishop
Richard died in 1184 and Lucius III. in 1185. The papal confirma-
tion, dated at the Lateran in March, limits it to the years 1182 or
1188. In consideration of this gift every succeeding dean had to
pay ten shillings for a pittance on the anniversary of the death of
the donor, and to give security for the payment at his institution to
the deanery.3 Ralph settled, moreover, on the chapter the tithe of
the demesne of his prebendal estate of Tottenhall,4 with a view
towards the endowment of a new hospital founded by Master Henry
of Northampton, prebendary of Kentish Town, within the cathedral
liberties. Henry of Northampton, who was one of the canons of °*her
Archbishop Baldwin's projected college at Lambeth, and whom he of the
nominated to the church of Monkton in Thanet, was likewise a P
benefactor ; he left certain houses to the chapter for the sustentation
of the almonry ; 5 probably it was by way of compensating his

1 Newcourt, i. 512 ; MS. Hutton, integram totam decimam de dominio
p. 111. praebendte mese de Tothale in blado et

2 MS. Hutton, pt. 2, p. 134. in omnibus fructibus de terra pro-

3 Newcourt, i. 34 ; MS. Hutton, venientibus, etc. Testibus Nicholao
part 2, p. 146. The original charters archidiacono Lond., &c.' MS. Hutton,
may be still in S. Paul's ; the confir- p. 112.

mation by Bishop Bichard III. will be 5 Newcourt, i. 169 ; MS. Hutton, p.

found, extracted from the register, in 52. ' B. de Diceto ecclesiae S. Pauli

the Appendix to the Preface to vol. ii. Lundoniensis decanus et ejusdem

(Eoll Series). ecclesiffi capitulum omnibus, &c.

4 Newcourt, i. 212. ' Eadulfus de salutem. Noverit universitas vestra
Diceto decanus ecclesise Sancti Pauli quod nos concessimus magistro Bi-
Londonise universis, &c. Noverit cardo de Lulinge domos quse fuerunt
caritas vestra me . . . concessisse magistri Henrici de Norhamptun con-
capitulo canonicorum Sancti Pauli canonici nostri, quas idem Henricus

74 THE HISTORICAL WORKS OF

relations that we find Richard his kinsman made lessee of the church
of Barnes. Another valuable gift was that of William of Beimels,
the nephew of the second Bishop Richard, and the last of the name
whom we find connected with 8. Paul's. He, for the health of the
souls of his father Robert of Belmeis and his uncle Richard, gave to
the canons his church of 8. Pancras, which was consequently
appropriated to the chapter and a vicarage ordained ; the tithe of
8. Pancras, however, went towards the maintenance of Henry of
Northampton's hospital.1 Richard of Stortford, the ' magister
scholar um,' imitated the example of the dean, and settled the stone
house, which he had built within the close, on his successor in his
own prebend, subject to an annual rent of a mark of silver to main-
tain an obit.2 Among minor charters is one in which Bishop Richard
the third grants to Ralph de Diceto and the chapter Ralph Blund
'our man and native,' of Hadham, free and quit of all bond of
servitude.3

Ralph's Not less distinctly than in the domestic economy of the

cathedral * is the work of Ralph to be traced in the statute book.

The customs and statutes of the cathedral were reduced to their
existing form and probably first codified by Dean Ralph Baldock,
afterwards bishop of London and chancellor to Edward I., a man
who seems to have succeeded to some portion of Ralph de Diceto's
love of order. In the process of arrangement he has not preserved
the exact wording of such statutes as had been previously enacted,
and there is perhaps far more than at first meets the eye, in which a
critical examination could determine the authorship of the several
parts.5 In more than one place the customs approved in the time of

nobis ad sustentationem elemosinaa scholar at Oxford; mentioned by

beati Pauli dedit . . . tencndas de Peter of Blois, Epp. (ed. Giles), i. 184 ;

nobis . . . pro iii. solidis annuatim in but tbe name was very common.

anniversario die obitus magistri Hen- * Dr. Simpson, Statutes, p. 132,

rici. Testibus, &c.' Henry can mentions a seal used by Ralph de

scarcely be the same Henry of North- Diceto, described in MS. Ashmole, 838,

ampton who is noticed by Mr. Foss fol. 401 ; bearing the inscription,

among the judges. Cf. Epp. Cant., p. ' Sigillum capituli Sancti Pauli Lon-

342. donie. 3. Paule standing upon a little

1 Newcourt, i. 190; MS.Hutton, p. 84. building like a church, holding up his

1 Newcourt, i. 151. right hand, and in his left a booke,

* « Omnibus Christi fidelibus, etc. open as if he were preaching, on each

Ricardus divina miseratione Lun- hand several people, some of which

doniensis ecclesiaa minister salutem in hold up their hands.'

Domino. Ad communem omnium * Such a critical examination has

notitiam pervenire volumus nos con- been given to the Statutes in the edi-

cessisse et dedisse Radulfo de Diceto tion of Dr. Sparrow Simpson, not

decano et capitulo beati Pauli Radul- only in reference to the original forms

fum Blundum hominem et nativum of the several enactments, but with

nostrum de Haddam, liberum et quie- illustrations from the usages of other

turn ab omni nexu servitutis; et ut cathedrals, and indeed with every

heec nostra, Ac. Testibus, &c." Regist. appliance that is required for the elu-

S. Pauli. One R. Blondus was a cidation of the subject.

MASTER KALPH DE DICETO 75

Ealph de Diceto are referred to as a sort of primary authority, or as
defining a period of limitation beyond which it was needless to seek
for the origin of the particular rule. In some few instances a
constitution of Ealph may be given entire ; such a statute is that
' de servientibus,' : which orders that all the servants of the church
shall be in the church in winter at the first stroke of the compline
bell, and in summer at the first stroke of the curfew ; that they are
to guard against the admission of suspicious strangers, and to be
answerable for all furniture carried outside the vestibule ; several
other directions are added, especially one which establishes a
graduated table of fees for gravedigging.2 If a statute like this shows
the dean's attention to the minute regulation of the lowest of the
church's inmates , another set of constitutions touch the most import-
ant of the cathedral institutions, the law of residence. The great The statute
statute of residence which was accepted by the chapter in 1192 is not drawn np in
given by Baldock in its proper form, but only by means of extracts ; l
and, curiously enough, another set of regulations prescribing the duties
of the residentiaries appears in a later part of the book under the title
of ' constitutions, statutes, and declarations of ancient and approved
customs published in the time of Master Ealph de Disceto, dean of
S. Paul's.' The text of the statute of residence, which seems to be
our author's own work, will be found in an appendix to the preface
of vol. (ii. (Eoll Series). It prescribes with great exactness the
amount of absence which disqualifies a canon from receiving a
share in the distribution of the common fund ; it defines the sense
in which a canon can be said to have well served the church, and
orders that equitable consideration shall be given to necessary causes
of absence. In particular two cases are provided for, which Ealph
knew from his own experience were likely to recur ; a canon who
was absent at a university was allowed forty shillings annually from
the common fund ; and one who was obliged to carry on a trial in
defence of his right was allowed to count the days of necessary
absence as days of residence. The approved customs are a much The ap-
more striking series of articles ; 3 they lay down the duties of hospi- t^of0113"
tality to be performed by the canons, the number of feasts which residence
they are to make, the duty of entertaining the mayor, sheriffs, Duties of a
aldermen, justices, and the great men of the court who may stand
in good stead to the church in difficult times. The new residentiary

1 Statutes, pp. 109, 124 : ' Ordina- puero nisi tantum id.' Statutes, pp.
turn fuit tempore Badulfi de Diceto 110, 124.

decani, quod,' &c. See also Dugdale, s Statutes, pp. 125 sq. : ' Constitu-

S. Paul's (ed. 1658) p. 270. tiones et statuta et declarationes con-

2 ' Item quod pro fovea mortui suetudinum antiquarum et approbata-
facienda non accipiat ultra iiid., et hoc rum editse tempore magistri Badulfi de
a divite ; a mediocri iid. vel id. ; a Disceto, decani Sancti Pauli.'

76

THE HISTORICAL WORKS OF

Ralph's in-
stitution of
a fraternity

Character
of the
cathedral
establish-
ment

is forbidden to dwell in the house of the Earl of Hereford, or in the
house of Diana or Rosamond ; he is not to be bled at all in the first
quarter of his residence, and in the other quarters once a month ;
he is bound to take part in the expenses and festivities of Childer-
mas and the boy bishop.1 These customs are many of them extra-
vagant and burdensome, and the whole were cancelled by Bishop
Braybrook in 1899 as a pretended statute of Ralph de Diceto.' It is
quite possible, however, that they were a genuine record of customs
which prevailed when the canons were all great and rich men, and
when the duty of hospitality was recognised as second only to that
of divine service.

A more interesting act, which bears the name of Ralph de Diceto
and the date 1197, is the institution of a fratery or fraternity for
the celebration of the office for the dead members, and the mass of
the Holy Ghost for living ones, and for the relief of the sick and
poor, at four annual meetings.3 The society, which does not in its
main features differ from the ordinary type of the religious guild, is
memorable only as a proof of the dean's anxiety that his church
should not be lacking in the more popular forms of charity and
devotion.

Besides the enactments which bear his name, the extract from
Hugh of S. Victor which has been more than once mentioned as
inserted by way of preamble to the statutes, and possibly the
extracts from the rule of Chrodegang, which are rather of antiquarian
value than of practical validity, may have been drawn out of the
scholarlike memory of Ralph de Diceto. The impression produced
by a careful examination of those parts of the volume which reflect
the conditions of the twelfth century is that the cathedral establish-
ment was organised on a plan not altogether unlike a college of
the present day ; residence was very much determined by the will
of the individual canon ; certain funds were divisible among the
residents only, each canon drew his bread and beer, and bread and

1 Statutes, p. 129: ' Debet etiam
novus residentiarius post cenam die
Sanctorum Innocentium ducere puer-
um suum cum daunsa et chorea et
torcbiis ad elemosinuriam, et ibi cum
torticiis potum et species singulis
ministrare, et liberatam vini, cervisiae
et specierum et candellarnm facere,'
Ac.

* Statutes, p. 153 : ' Statute vero
prsetensa ac consuetudines ejusdem
ecclesiffi canonicos in primo anno
residential ad majores expensas . . .
sive ad sumptuosa et excessiva con-
vivia et past us voluptuosos, et alias

excessivas expensas, quam ut pr oefertur
necnon choreas et complenas per vicos
et plateas . . . necnon statutum pnr
tensum editum tempore Radulfi de
Disseto quondam decani dicta) ecclesiffi
. . . cassamus, irritamus et annulla-
mus."

* Statutes, pp. 63, 64 : -de Fra-
teria beneficiorum ecclesiae Sancti
Pauli London., anno ab Incarnatione
Domini MCXCVII. in crust ino Annuncia-
tionis Beatea Maries, auctoritate
Radulfi de Dyceto, ecclesiee Sancti
Pauli London, decani, Ac.'

MASTER EALPH DE DICETO 77

beer for his dependents ; of the non-residents, some were farmers of
the manors of the corporation, some held the livings either bestowed
by the chapter or belonging to their several prebends ; some of the
canons were very young and waiting for prebends, some accumulated
duties in church and state, some were resident as exhibitioners in
foreign universities. Devotion, hospitality, education, were the chief
occupation of the residents. Great men, English and foreign, were
entertained at great cost ; kings and foreign prelates were received
with solemn processions, in which from time to time the city joined
the church, and great holy days were kept ' coronata civitate,' the
streets being hung with garlands. The great establishments of the
friars were not yet instituted. S. Paul's stood at the head of the
religious life of London, and by its side, at some considerable interval
however, S. Martin's le Grand, S. Bartholomew's, Smithfield, and
the great and ancient foundation of Trinity, Aldgate, which had
sprung out of the more ancient foundation of the English cnihten-
gild. Ralph de Diceto was, for zeal, learning, and local faithfulness,
a very fair representative man under a system which was soon to be
greatly modified.

The value set upon the relics of the saints at this time was very Ralph's
great, and the reputation of the system had not been so seriously of relics n
damaged as it was later on by detected imposture. Ealph de Diceto
was a collector of relics, and he bestowed no small store of them on
his church. A list of these gifts is preserved in the register, and
has been several times printed.1 They included a portion of the
knife of our Lord, of S. Mary Magdalene's hair, fragments of the bones
or dress of S. Stephen the Pope, S. Laurence, S. Martin, S. Oswald,
and many others. The vestry too in 1295 contained at least one
chasuble of Ealph de Diceto, made of red samite with vineated dorsal
of pure orfreys, a small contribution, perhaps, compared with the
more numerous and more costly vestments bestowed or bequeathed
by his contemporaries.2 The choir, however, and the library pre-
served more precious memorials of him ; there was his psalter, with

1 Dugdale, S. Paul's, ed. 1658, p. rege et martyre ; de stola et pallio

234 ; ed. Ellis, p. 337 : ' Hse sunt S. Maximini ; de baculo S. Maximini

' reliquiae quas Radulfus de Diceto Treverensis episcopi ; de capite S.

decanus contulit S. Paulo. [MS. Cod. Eugenii martyris ; ossa cujusdam

B. penes D. and C. fol. 1 b.] De cul- martyris de sociis S. Mauritii ; de

tello Domini ; de capillis S. Marios sandaliis et sudario et casula S. Re-

Magdalenae ; de S. Stephano papa et macli confessoris ; de osse et vesti-

martyre ; de osse beati Laurentii mento S. Walburgaa Virginis et de

raartyris ; de pallio aliisque reliquiis margaritis armilloe ipsius ; de osse

S. Martini Turonensis episeopi ; de Alexandri papse et martyris, de pulvere

S. Marco et Marcellina martyribus ; de reliquiarum.'

S. Victore martyre ; de testa S. Ypo- 2 These articles are mentioned in

liti martyris ; de baculo S. Martini the surveys of the treasures of the

Turonensis episcopi; de S. Oswaldo church taken in 1295 by Ralph Baldock

78

THE HISTORICAL WORKS OF

Booki left
bj Ralph to
bit church

a list at the beginning of the ornaments which he gave to the church ;
a homily book ' de peroptima litera,' in the finest Pauline hand, we
may be sure ; another book of homilies and martyrology bearing
his own name ; another martyrology containing copies of the
cathedral charters ; a great and fair and well noted gradual, a capi-
tularium and collectarium, good and new and of good penmanship,
which belonged to him ; last but not least, the volume of chronicles
printed in these volumes, the very MS. from which our text is
taken. Besides these there were in the library postills on the books
of Ecclesiasticus and Wisdom,1 — the dean's own sermons or lectures
delivered in church or school.

House, land, furniture, chapel, tithes, relics, vestments and books,
all testified to a long and deep attachment of the venerable dean to
his grand world-famed cathedral.

In this scanty sketch of Ralph's work as dean, and of the relics
which long remained to preserve his memory, we have far outstripped
the strict lines of our chronology, and must return to the date of

the dean ; Dugdale, ed. 1658, p. 212 ;
ed. Ellis, p. 320 :—

Item, casula Radulfi de Diceto de
rubeo sameto, cum dorsali puri auri-
frigii vineata,' pp. 215, 322.

' Item, psalteriurn in quo praemit-
tuntur ornamenta quae Radulfus de
Diceto contulit ecclesia Londoniensi,'
pp. 217, 324.

' Item, Omelium magnum de per-
optima litera, quod fuit Radulfi de
Diceto decani, incipiens in prima
rubrics " quid in festo primes digni-
tatis ; " initio prim® legend® " primo
tempore," alleviata cum litera auri in
qua depingitur puerperium beat® Vir-
ginia, et finit in rubrica in Octabis
Sancti Erkenwaldi, lectio 8. Evan-
gelii,' &c., pp. 218, 324.

• Item, aliud omelium ejusdem de
grossiori litera male ligatum, incipiens
praeter ea quffi scribuntur in custodiis
dominica prima Adventus in illo
Evangelio, " cum appropinquasset
Jesus Jerusalem ; " et finit in Evan-
gelio dominica prima ante Adventum
" cum sublevasset oculos Jesus," praeter
ea quae scribuntur in custodia.'

' Item, Omelium Sanctorum, male
ligatum, magnum de grossa, intitula-
tum in grossiori litera, " respice libro
Radulfi de Diceto decani ; " incipiens
in Nativitate Domini in Evangelio
"exiit edictum," et finit in legenda
Jeremiae de Virginibus.'

' Item, liber Radulfi de Diceto
decani nomine suo intitulato in tertio
folio a principio scilicet "Omelia et
martylogium," et finit in epistola
"Nolite peregrinari," ' pp. 218, 325.

' Item, aliud martylogium ejusdem
quod incipit " ego Theodricus,' et
postea intitulatur nomine ejusdem in
sexto folio a dextra noviori litera ; et
post incipit " in nomine Domini
nostri " in cartis concessis terrarum
et in capella decani,' pp. 219, 325.

' Oradale magnum et pulchrum et
bene notatum quod fuit Radulfi de
Diceto, nullo praamisso. Incipit " ad
te levavi animam meam," ' pp. 219,
326.

' Item capitularium et collectarium
bonum et novum et de bona litera,
cum canone missm, quod fnit Radulfi
de Diceto decani, incipiens in magna
rubrica "sicut in festo primes digni-
tatis," et finit " in secreto unius vir-
ginis," ' pp. 221, 327.

' Cronica oomposita a Radulfo de
Diceto ; et incipit liber a rubrica " In
opusculo sequent! trium temporum,"
et finit in penultimo folio in rubrica
" comites Flandrenses," ' pp. 222,
328.

1 ' Item, postilla R. de Diceto super
Ecclesiasticum et super librum Sa-
pientias, 2Ddo folio, " vel unumquod-
que translatum." ' Dugdale, pp. 277,
393.

MASTEK EALPH DE DICETO 79

his appointment to trace the thin thread of his more public appear-
ance.

For several years after his appointment to the deanery we know Notes of

n t i • -i i • occurrences

nothing, from other sources, of our author s history, and his own which he
•works illustrate it only by the occasional record of the promotion of witnessed
a friend or fellow canon. Thus, in 1182, he mentions the resignation
of the see of Lincoln by Geoffrey the king's son, and the election of
Walter of Coutances, who was afterwards his most faithful corre-
spondent. The consecration and enthronisation of the latter prelate
are noted, as well as his speedy translation to Rouen. Walter is
described by Peter of Blois as a member of a family, doubtless of
Norman extraction, settled in Devonshire or Cornwall,1 and his
friendship with Ealph may have begun either at the university or
at court, where he had been for some years vice-chancellor or keeper of
the seal to Henry II. We know him best as justiciar in the reign
of Eichard. In 1186 William de Vere, canon of S. Paul's, the
friend of Ealph at Paris, was consecrated to the see of Hereford, and
William of Northall, another canon and archdeacon of Gloucester,
to that of Worcester. Early in 1187 Ealph lost his old friend and
patron, Bishop Foliot, and the see of London was not filled up for
nearly three years. Within a few weeks after Foliot's death he had
to receive the archbishop of Canterbury, Baldwin, who visited the
church on Mid-Lent Sunday, and he took advantage of the opportunity
to obtain from him an injunction forbidding the persons who were The see of
in charge of the temporalities of the see to interfere with the spiritual during^
officers in the discharge of their duties. They had infringed the v
rights of the archdeacon of Middlesex in the church of Hormead, in
Hertfordshire. The guardians of the temporalities were Ealph de
Hauterive, archdeacon of Colchester, and Eichard Brito, archdeacon
of Coventry, the latter acting as a clerk of the Exchequer.2 Probably
the dean, by himself or in conjunction with some of the other
members of the chapter, was acting as guardian of the spiritualities,
for the dispute on this point between the chapter and the archbishop
does not seem to have begun as yet.3 Baldwin, in the letter referred
to, makes no mention of any such officials, but it must have been in Ealph om-
this capacity that the dean officiated at the coronation of Eichard I., coronation e
when, because ' the church of London was vacant at the time, Ealph
de Diceto, the dean of the church of London, ministered to the arch-
bishop in the holy oil and chrism.'

Henry II. had, shortly before his death, determined to fill up the

1 P. Blesens. Epistt. (ed. Giles), i. 3 See the final agreement on this
p. 252. point in the Statutes of S. Paul's, p.

2 Pipe Koll of Eichard I., pp. 11, 382 ; and the Appendix to Wharton's
12. Historia de Episcopis.

80

THE HISTORICAL WORKS OF

A new

election,

and journey
to France

The new
bishop
Richard
Pitz Xeal

Friendship
of Ralph
and bishop
Longehamp

vacant see, and he and Archbishop Baldwin had summoned the dean
with eight of the canons to attend the royal court, wherever it might
be, on the Sunday 'Isfci sunt dies' March 26, 1189.1 Ralph and
his companions obeyed the citation and were abroad for fourteen
weeks, during which time it would seem that Henry, harassed to
death as he was by misfortune and illness, found no leisure to attend
them. Forty pounds, as the Pipe Boll records, and as Ralph has
himself noted, were paid to them for their expenses, out of the
revenues of the see which were now in the king's hands.

Henry died on the 6th of July. On the 15th September, at Pipe-
well, the see of London was filled up by the election of one of the
canons, who was likewise dean of Lincoln, Richard, the son of the late
bishop of Ely, Nigel, treasurer to the king, and well known to us as
the author of the Dialogus de Scaccario. No doubt the canonical
ceremony of election was gone through, but it was well understood
that Richard, like the other prelates appointed at the time, was the
king's nominee. He had been freely chosen bishop of Lincoln under
Henry II., but that king had refused to allow his promotion, alleging
that he was rich enough already, and that thenceforth he would make
bishops only such men as the Lord should choose.2 His son had no
such scruples, and the chapter were probably glad to elect a member of
their own body, instead of such a man as the Chancellor Longehamp.

Richard of London and William of Ely were consecrated together
on the 81st of December at Lambeth. It would be the duty of
Ralph to present the elect of London to the archbishop and to assist
at his enthronisation, which took place the same day. We may
presume that he improved the opportunity of cultivating the
acquaintance of Longehamp, for whose great abilities he seems to
have entertained a profound admiration. To a man of Ralph's age
and understanding it would be wrong to impute the character of a
flatterer or even of a courtier ; but the letter which he addressed to
Longehamp on his elevation to the offices of legate and justiciar, and
which he prefixed, as a sort of dedication, to the royal tables and
other opuscula contained in the volume now preserved at Ripley
Castle, shows that he was dazzled by the rapid and brilliant pro-
motion of the chancellor. Great as was the fall of Longehamp and
grievous as were the faults of his administration, Ralph writes of
him throughout with moderation, and, when he wishes to point the
moral, borrows from Sidonius Apollinaris the description of the
character and career of Arjandus.

The important positions held by these two bishops during
Richard's absence on the Crusade enabled them to furnish our

1 The statement of the Pipe Roll,
p. 12, is: ' Et canonicis Sancti Pauli de
Londoniis qui tranafretaverunt ad

eligendum episcopum, pro expensis
suis xl. libras per breve regis.'
* Ben. Pet. i. 345, 346.

MASTER KALPH DE DICETO 81

author, who was now known to be writing the annals of the time, with Ralph now-
direct and most valuable information. He was indeed singularly writing a
well placed for knowing all that was passing both in the council of
government and among those who were discontented with the adminis-
tration of Longchamp. At the same moment he was the trusted
friend of William Longchamp, Walter of Coutances, and Richard
FitzNeal. Probably his sympathies were chiefly with the last, who
was throughout the period faithful to the cause which he saw to be
most beneficial to the king, and who was free from the influence of
those motives, whether of arbitrary self-will or of ambitious self-
seeking, which derogate from the equally proved fidelity of the
other two. But the dean does not employ, in any part of his de-
scription of the contest, language that implies any strong feeling
on his part. Even in speaking of the great session of the barons in
the chapterhouse of S. Paul's, he makes little further remark than
that the bishop of London was the only person present who in his
oath to the king made any reservation of the rights of his order ; a
point which looks as if his mind was more employed with the
controversies of 1163 than those with 1191.

In 1194, on Eichard's return from captivity, he was received Richard at
with a solemn procession at S. Paul's on the 23rd of March, and on
the 19th of May the Archbishop of Rouen visited the cathedral with
similar pomp, and preached to the people, being entertained, after
mass, with a feast in the bishop's palace. On both occasions no
doubt the dean was present. In 1196 he seems to have been an motof
eye-witness of the riot caused by William FitzOsbert. Even here he

does not go out of his way to make strong remarks. It seems that
he looked on the popular grievance as a real grievance, but that he
knew the demagogue to be a bad man, and regarded the severities
of the Government as justified, aud the precautionary measures of
the justiciar as wise and politic. In 1197 he records the death of
William Longchamp and the promotion of his brother Robert to
be abbot of S. Mary's at York. One of Longchamp's last communi- other
cations had been the letter in which he transmitted the epistle of ™e^™
the Old Man of the Mountain, exonerating the king from the charge Ultercst
of procuring the murder of Conrad of Montferrat. In 1198 he has
to record for the third time the death of his bishop. Richard Fitz-
Neal died on the 10th September : how much Ralph owed to him
in the preparation of his history it is easier to conjecture than to
prove. Richard had himself in his ' Tricolumnis ' written the early
annals of the reign of Henry II., and living as he did, first as canon
and afterwards as bishop, in close neighbourhood with Ralph de
Dieeto, may very probably have imparted to him his own views on
the great crisis of that reign. But if it were so, it is impossible,

G

82

THE HISTORICAL WORKS OF

Another

• [,>IM ]..l!

. f.-:i. n

Kalpli at the
consec ration
of William
of S. Mere

Kalpb on the
demolition of
the college
church at
Lambeth

Other per-
sonal remi-
niscence*

Correspon-
dence with
Walter of
Cuiitancen

without better knowledge than we possess of the contents of the
• Tricolumnis,' to show that our author had the privilege of using it
The vacancy of the see again involved a journey to France for the
chapter. On the 9th of November the king summoned a committee
of seven canons to meet him on the 7th of December. The dean
was not required to attend, probably in consideration of his age,
and it was ordered that the precentor Walter, who was with the
archbishop in Normandy at the time, should be one of the
committee as a substitute, perhaps, for his superior. Ralph,
however, did not let himself be overlooked. Whether he took the
journey or not we are not informed, but he specially records that it
was at his postulation, or on his presentation, that the bishop elect
was consecrated. The ceremony was performed on the 28rd of May,
1199, in S. Katharine's Chapel at Westminster, four days before the
coronation of John. William of S. Mere I'Eglise, the new bishop,
was, like his predecessor, a canon of S. Paul's, whose advancement
Ralph had watched for several years. As early as 1178 a con-
temporary hand recorded in the margin of the ' Imagines,' that it
was in that year William of S. Mere 1'Eglise had come to the king's
court, and in 1189 he had become dean of S. Martin's.

The ' Imagines ' contain after this only one or two incidental
notices of personal observation. The demolition of Archbishop
Baldwin's church at Lambeth provokes from the dean the severest
remark that occurs in the whole book : — ' to Peter was given the
power of building up, of multiplying and transferring sees, but by
what law or canon was bestowed on him licence to lay waste a holy
place may be left to the judgment of Him who gave the power to
build up.' Under the year 1200 we find a complaint of the burden-
some exaction from the religious houses of London, which resulted
from the entertaining of Philip, the Pope's notary ; and another
severe remark on the natural and innate greediness of the Romans.
In December 1200, the dean seems to have witnessed the benedic-
tion of Ralph Arundel, a Londoner, as Abbot of Westminster, the
ceremony being performed in S. Paul's ; and in September 1201, to
have attended the reception of the legate John of Salerno in his
cathedral church. The last entry but one in the ' Imagines ' notes
the summoning of the bishop of London and others to Normandy,
whither the archbishop sailed on the 14th of December.

The letters of Walter of Coutances which, from 1196 onwards,
occupy the largest part of the pages of the ' Imagines,' contain little
that is of historical interest, and less still that illustrates the
personal history of our author. One letter of Ralph's, anonymous,
and containing, besides the usual generalities of comfort and

MASTER RALPH DE DICETO 83

sympathy, a couple of verses apparently of his own composition, is
in this aspect the most valuable part of the correspondence.

Two or three of the later notices of local events and matters of visits of
personal interest must close our survey of the life of Ralph de p
Diceto. The record of the visits of prelates and princes to the apaul's
church of the ' doctor of the nations ' is a marked feature throughout
the ' Imagines.' Thus, in 1183, we find Archbishop Eichard cele-
brating mass in S. Paul's a few days before his death ; in 1184
Philip of Heinsberg, archbishop of Cologne, was solemnly received,
and for the first time in our dean's experience, the city was ' crowned,'
and there was joy, honour, and dancing in the streets in honour of
the prelate and his companion, the Count of Flanders ; in 1187
Archbishop Baldwin was solemnly received, and, the see being
vacant, consecrated the chrism on the Thursday in holy week, and
celebrated mass on Easter Day. In 1194 Eichard, as we have seen,
found time to visit S. Paul's ' coronata civitate,' and the Archbishop
of Eouen followed in a few weeks. The reception of John of
Salerno is nearly the last event recorded. We may imagine how
attentively the old annalist would listen to the discourse of his great
guests for something to embody in his book.

The statute of residence drawn up in 1192 contains the names Names of
of several of the canons who stood round the dean in these last who°wereS

days, and enable us to trace the changes which must have affected

the tone of society in the chapter. The Archdeacon Nicolas, whose Pamons

experiences must have run parallel with Ealph's for forty years, is

gone, and in his place is Peter of Blois, the learned rhetorician and Peter of

theologian, who is so well known to us by his collected epistles. It

is somewhat significant that Ealph de Diceto never mentions him ;

doubtless the dean saw through the pretentious, ambitious, self-

seeking adventurer. Another name, also calculated to increase the Waiter Map

literary tone of the chapter, is that of Walter Map, the archdeacon

of Oxford, whose appointment to the precentorship of Lincoln is

specially recorded in the ' Imagines.' Walter's poems and his book

' De Nugis Curialium,' the latter of which contains some marvellous

tales not at all unlikely to have come out of Ealph's store, would no

doubt recommend him to the dean. The schools of the cathedral

were now under Master Eichard of Stortford. Master Alard, who Richard of

succeeded Ealph in the deanery, appears as a deacon ; Eobert

Clifford and Henry of Northampton are still alive ; the families of

the late bishops are well represented ; there is still Henry, the son

of Bishop Eobert de Sigillo ; and Eichard Euffus, a relic perhaps

of the house of Belmeis ; there are Gilbert archdeacon of Middlesex,

Ealph archdeacon of Hereford, and Eobert Foliot, all kinsmen and other

nominees of the great Gilbert. Other names recall the court and

G2

84

THE HISTORICAL WORKS OF

Society at
S. Paul't

Difficulty iu
ascertaining
the date of
Ralph's
death

i;;i;v'- date

Evidence

of the

' Imagiiiei '

He wag
probably
alive M lace
M March 25,
1302

council of Henry II. ; Oabert de Camera, Richard of Windsor,
Brand the king's clerk, and William of Ely, who was, after the
death of Bishop Richard, the king's treasurer. He, perhaps, was a
kinsman of Richard FitzNeal, and a descendant of the organiser of
the Exchequer. One name occurs very suggestive of a new principle
of papal policy afterwards to be dangerously developed, Laurence,
the nephew of Pope Celestine III. Ralph de Hauterive, the brave
archdeacon of Colchester, must have been dead ; his successor
Richard appears among the confirming canons ; Archdeacon Paris,
too, and many others whose names may be found in the ancient lists
of the canons, and whose contributions towards our author's narra-
tive may here and there be detected. We are not, however, obliged
to regard the old age of the dean as desolate or dull ; there are old
friends still about him, and he keeps up his interest in the public
history and the promotion of his fellow canons to the very last. He
cannot have lived long after the last event noted in the ' Imagines.'

The date of the death of Ralph de Diceto has never been exactly
ascertained. Bale, who in his first edition had fixed the period of
his ' flourishing ' (claruisse fertur) in the year 1200, in his second
edition substituted for it the year 1210.1 This statement, which
may have been a mere error of the press, was accepted as probable,
or at least as proving that the dean was alive as late as 1210. The
date was accepted, however, as a conjecture, only for lack of a better.
Wharton and Le Neve both expressly stated Bale to be their
authority, and the latter was unable to reconcile the statement with
the fact pointed out by Newcourt,2 that Alard of Burnham, the
successor of Ralph, was dean in 1204. So high, however, was Bale's
authority — that, rather than suppose him to have been mistaken, it
was suggested that Ralph probably resigned the deanery before his
death. As there can be no doubt that Bale's date was a mere con-
jecture, the question must be further argued.

The last place in which Ralph in his own book mentions himself
is in 1199, when he tells that he presented William of S. Mere
1'Eglise to the archbishop to be consecrated to the see of London
on the 28rd of May. The ' Imagines ' are continued for nearly three
years longer, and if the latter pages were drawn up under his eye,
he must have been alive as late as March 25, 1202. The authority
for the latter pages of this work is not beyond dispute, and as the
original MS. closes at the coronation of John, we cannot certainly
prolong the author's actual superintendence of the work longer than
June 1199. It is, however, probable that the statement made under

1 ' Claruit anno Servatoris nostri 1210, quo Chronica finiebat sub Jobanne
Aaglorum rege.' Possibly 1210 is a misprint for 1201.
1 Itepertorium, i. 34.

MASTER EALPH DE DICETO 85

the year 1201, that the Cardinal John of Salerno was solemnly
received at S. Paul's on the 31st of August, was made by the
Pauline scribe, and proves the continuation to have been written at
S. Paul's. If this is the case, we can scarcely suppose the dean to
have died in the interval, for that event would almost of necessity
have been noted in its place. It may then, I think, be allowed
that on the evidence of the MSS. of the ' Imagines,' Ralph de Diceto
was certainly alive in June 1199, and most probably as late as
March 1202.

We have next to look for the further limit, the date at which his His succes-
successor appears in office. This is supplied by Newcourt : the office in
first recorded act of Dean Alard was ' the confirmation of the church
of Shoreditch to the office of precentor of S. Paul's,' l and if that
confirmation was made soon after the grant of that church by King
John, which was dated on the 25th of March in the fifth year of his
reign, 1204, as in all likelihood it was, Alard must have been dean
early in 1204. The obit of Ealph de Diceto was kept on the 22nd
of November.2 If these two limits be accepted he must have died
on the 22nd of November either in 1202 or in 1203. The following
consideration may lead to the conclusion that the former is the true
date.

Giraldus Cambrensis was at this moment carrying on one of his ^P11, em-

17 ployed as a

long struggles with adverse destiny in the shape of an appeal to judge on the

Rome and a trial before apostolic judges delegate in England. It is curaidus

not worth our while to discuss the exact nature of the contest, or

the reasons which may have led Innocent III. to appoint Ralph

de Diceto one of the judges, still less to speculate on the course

which the dean may be supposed to have taken. It is enough to

remark that early in the year 1201 3 Innocent III. had nominated

as judges Eustace bishop of Ely, the dean of London, and the

archdeacon of Buckingham. Letters from the Pope to these judges

preserved by Giraldus, dated July 27, 1201,4 and July 29, 1201 ; *

and a letter of Giraldus himself, addressed to the same, and dated

before October, 19, 1202, is likewise extant.6 The judges had in fact

held, or proposed to hold, five sessions upon his cause. On the 26th Various ses-

of January 1202 he had appeared at Worcester. The judges had fu&ges

1 Newcourt, Repertorium, i. 35, 97 ; chronological relation of the following

Rot. Chart, (ed. Hardy), p. 124. It is references will be found explained in

to this foundation of the precentorship the Councils and Ecclesiastical docu-

that the letter of Peter of Blois to ments (Haddan and Stubbs), vol. i.

Innocent III. refers ; Ep. 217 ; Opp., pp. 419-429.

ed. Giles, ii. 170. 4 Gir. Camb. Opp. iii. 68, 69.

- Dugdale, S. Paul's; Milman, 5 Ibid. iii. 70.

Annals of S. Paul's, p. 513. 6 Ibid. iii. 237.

3 Gir. Camb. Opp. iii. 68, 69. The

THE HISTORICAL WORKS OF

Ralph's
name not
Included in
the oommii-
don of 1203

Probable
dmte of his
death, Nor.
82, 1JOS

appointed deputies, the archdeacon of Gloucester was to represent
Bishop Eustace ; the prior of 8. Mary's was to act as substitute for
the dean and archdeacon ; and he only appeared to represent the
three.1 Again, Giraldus appeared at Newport on the 4th of May ;
the bishop did not attend, and the dean again sent a substitute.*
On the 18th of June at Brackley the bishop was present ; the dean
and archdeacon sent substitutes.3 At Bedford, on the 1st of August,
another session was held ; * and at last, on the 9th or 16th of
September, all the three judges met at S. Alban's in person.5 On
the 16th of October the judges intended to make their report before
the archbishop and his suffragans, but, the week before that,
Giraldus, finding his safety endangered, fled from England and
betook himself to Rome.6 The next papal document issued in the
case is an order for a new election to the see of S. David's dated
May 25 or 26, 1208.7 This is addressed to Bishop Eustace, the
archdeacon of Buckingham, and the bishop of Worcester. It seems
most probable that, if the dean of London were yet alive, the delega-
tion would have been continued to him, for in the many long
records of suits carrried on at Rome at this period it is difficult to
find instances in which a change in the body of judges delegate is
made without strong cause. It is true we are not quite certain that
in this case the dean of London was Ralph de Diceto,8 but it is
extremely probable that he was the person so designated, and that
he was not superseded by the nomination of a new judge,9 but vacated
his place by death. If this be true he died on the 22nd of November,
1202. If on further investigation it should appear that he was
superseded, then/if the dean were indeed Ralph de Diceto, his death
must be fixed on the 22nd of November 1208 ; if he were not Ralph,
but his successor Alard, the date must be thrown back to the year
1201. But there can be little doubt that the venerable scholar was
himself employed as papal judge, and that we may thus approximate
to, if we cannot actually determine, the date of his death.10

1 Gir. Camb. Opp. iii. 203.

• Ibid. iii. 215.
Ibid. iii. 218.
Ibid. iii. 221.
Ibid. iii. 223, 228.
Ibid. iii. 237.

Ibid. iii. 281 : cf. pp. 71 sq.

It is just possible, but most
improbable, that the dean of London
might be the dean of S. Martin's le
Grand. See Rot. Chart., ed. Hardy,
p. 64.

* It is also possible that the Pope
might regard the commission issued

in 1203 as the beginning of a new
business ; certainly the bishop of
Worcester had been taking part with
Giraldus before the older commission
had concluded its work ; and his
name may have been now inserted at
Giralduu's application ; but it is less
probable than that the dean was dead,
10 Ten shillings were paid to the
major canons annually on this day: 'Is-
tam solutionem decanus in institutions
sua cavebit facere, et haec et alia pro
domibus suis in atrio S. Pauli ordirmta
fideliter observare.' List of Obits in

MASTER RALPH DE DICETO 87

Archbishop Parker has preserved, in an extract from an ancient Legend of
fragment, a story of the death of a dean of S. Paul's which must be a^a^of °f
noticed here, not for its importance or probability, but to guard s-paul>s
against the possibility of its being referred to Ralph de Diceto. In
the time of Archbishop Hubert Walter, he says, a dean of the church
of S. Paul at London was keeper of the king's treasury, or, as it is
called, the treasurer. In that office he collected a great treasure. On
his deathbed he was advised by the bishops and magnates to
receive the Holy Eucharist, but, from fear and dread, he constantly
deferred doing so. Wondering at this, the friendly lords requested
the king to visit him and compel him to receive the sacrament.
The dean promised to do so the next day, and then proceeded to
dictate his will to a single scribe. Having turned the rest of his
attendants out of the room, he kept the notary waiting for some time.
' In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost,'
the formula began. When the dean found that this was being
written, he angrily ordered the writer to erase it and to write these
words only : ' I leave all my goods to my lord the king, my body to
the grave, and my soul to the devil.' Then he died, and the king
gratefully ordered his body to be carried in a cart and thrown into
a river.1 That the archbishop somewhere found the story we need Notappiic-
not doubt, but it is not likely ever to have been anything but a Ralph de
fable, and there is no dean of S. Paul's to whom it could be made to I
apply. The only dean who died during Hubert's pontificate was
Ralph de Diceto, and he was not the king's treasurer. The only
treasurer who died during the same period was Bishop Richard, who
died in England when the king was absent in France. William of
Ely, his successor, was a canon of S. Paul's, but not dean, and he
long outlived both Hubert and his master, retaining his office until

S. Paul's, by Archdeacon Hale, at the rogavit, monuit atque jussit. Is se id

end of Milman's Annals of S. Paul's, facturum crastino promisit. Interea

p. 513. ad testamentum condendum monitus

1 Antiquitates (ed. Drake), p. 228. est; ad quod paratus exire prseter

' Nam et eodem tempore ecclesise unum scriptorem ceteros voluit. Is

Paulines Londonensis decanus serarii testamentum scripturus exspectans

regii custos fuit, sive ut vocant quid decanus dictaret, ex more testa-

thesaurarius ; is, eo fungens officio, mentorum sic orsus est : il In nomine

ingentem clam thesaurum coacervavit ; Patris et Filii," etc. Quod cum

tandem in lethalem morbum incidit ; decanus comperisset, iratus jussit id

cumque jam valetudinis nulla spes deleri et hsec verba tantum scribi :

esset, ab episcopis et magnatibus " Lego omnia bona mea domino regi,

admonetur de sumendo corpore Christi. corpus sepulturas, et animam diabolo.'

Quo audito cohorruit remque con- Quo dicto expiravit ; rex cadaver

sulto distulit. Quod illi mirati regem illius jussit curru exportari atque in

rogant ut ad sacramenti perceptionem amnem projici et demergi.' [Ex

eum compelleret. Accedens rex eum fragmento quodam veteri.]

88 THE HISTORICAL WORKS OF MASTER RALPH DE DICETO

the year 1228. I have not tried to explore the origin of the story ;
it is sufficient to prove that it cannot he true here. Ralph de Diceto
left behind him no such tradition of wickedness and despair ; the
canons of his church observed his anniversary as the day of the
death of ' Ralph de Diceto, the good dean.'

89

THE CHRONICLE OF THE EEIGNS OF HENRY II.
AND RICHARD I. (A.D. 1169-1192)

KNOWN COMMONLY UNDER THE NAME OF BENEDICT
OF PETERBOROUGH

[THK following is one of the most celebrated of the Prefaces written by
Bishop Stubbs. It contains a very interesting description of the character
and aims of Henry II., an explanation of the many difficult problems
which he was called upon to solve, and an account of the measures
adopted to ' eliminate feudalism from government.' Henry's judicial,
fiscal, religious, and military systems are fully dealt with, and a valuable
criticism on the results of the King's life work concludes a very remark-
able piece of English history.]

HAVING devoted the Preface to the first volume to the discussion
of the literary history of this book, I will now proceed to sketch the
character and position of the great prince whose reign forms the
subject of far the largest portion of its contents.

It is almost a matter of necessity for the student of history to some real-
work out for himself some definite idea of the characters of the great character
men of the period he is employed upon. History cannot be well "^tj^17
read as a chess problem, and the man who tries to read it so is not student of

history

worthy to read it at all. Its scenes cannot be realised, its lessons
cannot be learned, if the actors are looked on merely as puppets.
A living interest must invest those who played a part in making
the world what it is : those whose very existence has left indelible
traces on its history must have had characteristics worthy of the
most careful investigation.

Such a judgment as may be formed in the nineteenth century, such reaiisa-
of a king of the twelfth may well seem unsatisfactory. With the approximate
utmost pains it is hard to persuade ourselves that a true view is at best
obtained, or is even obtainable. We know too little of his personal
actions to be able in many cases to distinguish between them and
those of his advisers ; or to say whether he was a man of weak will
or of strong ; whether his good deeds proceeded from fear or from
virtue, or from the love of praise ; whether his bad ones were the

90

THE CHRONICLE OF THE HEIGNS

Opinions of
con tempo-
rary writer*
M to charac-
ter are not to
be depended
upon

Kings in u-t
be judged by
their acts,
and that
judgment
tested by
their repu-
tation in
their own
days

Such

judgment
possible in
the case of a
long reign

workings of hasty impulse, or the breaking out of concealed habit,
or the result of a long struggle between good motives and evil
passions.

Neither can we accept the delineations of contemporary writers
without carefully testing them at every step. They are almost
always superficial, but if that were the only fault we might be
content to accept them as the verdict of ordinary judges, and it is
always satisfactory to know what a a man's contemporaries thought
of him, even if they were neither close observers nor judicious critics.
But their descriptions are seldom to be trusted even in this respect,
for they betray almost universally a bias for or against the hero.
The one in a thousand who is so far removed from personal feeling
as to wish to take a philosophical or consistent view, is probably too
far removed from acquaintance to be able to distinguish the truth
from falsehood. The contemporary historian cannot view the career
of his leading character as a whole ; he sees it too closely, or else he
sees it through a distorting medium. Hence the unsearchableness
of the king's heart is so often given by mediaeval writers as the
reason for measures the bent of which they do not see, and as to
which, for the want of acquaintance with other acts of the same
kind, they cannot generalise.

The heart of kings is unsearchable ; but on the other hand their
freedom of action is, or rather was in the middle ages, uncontrolled
by external restraints. In them, as in no other men, can the out-
ward conduct be safely assumed to be the unrestrained expression of
the inward character. It is from observing the general current of
the life, from the examination of the recorded acts of it, that the only
reasonable view of the character can be obtained. Standing too far
off in time and mode of thought to be in much danger of imputing
modern principles and motives, we can generalise somewhat as to
the inward life of a man if we know what his outward life was ; and
then we can compare our conclusion with the judgment of contem-
poraries, and see whether such men as they were would be likely to
think as they have done of such a man as we have described to our-
selves.

If we know enough of the facts of a man's life we can draw such
a picture. Character that is not shown in act is not strong enough
to be worthy of the name. The man whose character is worth
study must be one whose acts bear the marks of character. In the
view of a long life, some generalisations can almost always be drawn,
from the repetition of acts, from the uniformity or uncertainty of
policy. A king who lets his advisers act for him in one case will show
the like weakness in others ; will act in different ways under differ-
ent personal influences. But one who all his life chooses his

OF HENEY II. AND RICHAKD I. 91

counsellors on one principle, and follows with them a uniform line A uniform
of policy, chooses them because he approves their policy, or rather £ SS^S
because they will carry out his own. And that policy, if such be
traceable, is the expression of the strongest principles of his own
character ; it may be confused or perplexed by his minor traits, but
it cannot be suppressed by them, and if it exists it will be seen in
operation.

A careful reading of the history of the three centuries of Angevin Curse on
kings might almost tempt one to think that the legend of their piantagenet
diabolical orgin and hereditary curse was not a mere fairy tale, but
the mythical expression of some political foresight or of a strong
historical instinct. But, in truth, no such theory is needed ; the
vices of kings, like those of other men, carry with them their pre-
sent punishment ; whilst with them, even more signally than with
other men, the accumulation of subsequent misery is distinctly
conspicuous, and is seen to fall with a weight more overwhelming
the longer their strength or their position has kept it poised.

It was not that their wickedness was of a monstrous kind ; such Their sins
wickedness indeed was not a prominent feature in the character of
the mediaeval devil ; nor was it mere capricious cruelty or wanton
mischief. Neither were their misfortunes of the appalling sort
wrought out by the Furies of Attic tragedy. Of such misery there
were not wanting instances, but not enough to give more than an
occasional luridness to the picture. Nor was it, as in the case of the
Stewarts, that the momentum of inherited misfortune and misery
had become a conscious influence under which no knightly or kingly
qualities could maintain hope, and a meaner nature sought a refuge
in recklessness. All the Piantagenet kings were high-hearted men,
rather rebellious against circumstances than subservient to them.
But the long pageant shows us uniformly, under so great a variety Common

« • J- -J 1 1L u • e \ -tt. -x- characteris-

of individual character, such signs of great gifts and opportunities tics of the
thrown away, such unscrupulousness in action, such uncontrolled
passion, such vast energy and strength wasted on unworthy aims,
such constant failure and final disappointment, in spite of constant
successes and brilliant achievements, as remind us of the conduct
and luck of those unhappy spirits who, throughout the middle ages,
were continually spending superhuman strength in building in a
night inaccessible bridges and uninhabitable castles, or purchasing
with untold treasures souls that might have been had for nothing,
and invariably cheated of their reward.

Only two in the whole list strike us as free from the hereditary Exceptions

" "in the cases

sins : Edward I. and Henry VI., the noblest and the unhappiest of of Edward i.
the race ; and of these the former owes his real greatness in history, vi.
not to the success of his personal ambition, but to the brilliant

92

THE CHRONICLE OF THE REIGNS

varieties <.f
stanetcr

Henry ii.

•MI ';

Apparent

ter of Henry

qualities brought out by the exigencies of his affairs ; whilst on the
latter, both as a man and as a king, fell the heaviest crash of
accumulated misery. None of the others seem to have had a wish
to carry out the true grand conception of kingship. And thus it is
with the extinction of the male line of Plantagenet that the social
happiness of the English people begins. Even Henry VII., though,
perhaps, as selfish a man as any of his predecessors, and certainly
less cared for or beloved, seems to open an era during which the vices
of the monarchs have been less disastrous to their subjects than
before, and the prosperity of the state has increased in no propor-
tion to the ability of the kings.

And yet no two of these princes were alike in the constituent
proportions of their temperament. The leading feature of one was
falsehood, of another cruelty, of another licentiousness, of another
unscrupulous ambition : one was the slave of women, another of un-
worthy favourites ; one a raiser of taxes, another a shedder of the
blood of his people. Yet there was not one thoroughly contemptible
person in the list. Many had redeeming qualities, some had great
ones ; all had a certain lion-like nobility, some had a portion of the
real elements of greatness. Some were wise ; all were brave ; some
were pure in life, some gentle as well as strong ; but is it too hard to
say that all were thoroughly selfish, all were in the main unfortunate?

In the character of Henry II. are found all the characteristics of
this race. Not the greatest, nor the wisest, nor the worst, nor the most
unfortunate, he still unites all these in their greatest relative propor-
tions. Not so impetuous as Richard, or Edward III., or Henry V. ;
not so wise as Edward I. ; not so luxurious l as John or Edward IV. ;
not so false as Henry III., nor so greedy as Henry IV., nor so cruel as
the princes of the house of York ; he was still eminently wise and
brave, eminently cruel, lascivious, greedy, and false, and eminently
unfortunate also, if the ruin of all the selfish aims of his sagacious
plans, the disappointment of his affections, and the sense of having
lost his soul for nothing, can be called misfortune.

It would be a great mistake to view the personal and political
character of Henry as one of unmingled vice. It was a strange
compound of inconsistent qualities rather than a balance of opposing
ones, yet the inconsistencies were so compounded as to make him
restless rather than purposeless, and the opposing qualities were
balanced sufficiently to suffer him to carry out a consistent policy.
His fortunes, therefore, bear the impress of the man. He was

1 William of Newburgh compares
him with his grandfather to the dis-
advantage of the latter : ' In libidinem
pronior, conjugalem modum excessit,

formam quidem in hoc tenens
avitum, sod tamen avo hujus intern-
perantise palmam reliquit.' Hist.
Angl. iii. 26.

OF HENRY II. AND RICHARD I. 93

a brave and consummate warrior, yet he never carried on war on
a large scale, or hesitated to accept the first overtures of peace.1 He
was impetuous and unscrupulous, yet he never tempted fortune. He
was violent in hatred, yet moderate in revenge ; 2 a lover of good
men, a corrupter of innocent women ; at once religious and pro-
fane, lawless and scrupulous of right ; a maker of good laws, and a
seller of justice ; 3 the most patient and provoking of husbands ; the
most indulgent and exacting of fathers ; playing with the children,
whose ingratitude was breaking his heart, the great game of state-
craft as if they had been pawns. He was tyrannical in mood without
being a tyrant either in principle or in the exigencies of policy. In
power and character, by position and alliances, the arbiter of
Western Europe in both war and peace, 4 he never waged a great war
or enjoyed a sound peace ; he never until his last year made an un-
satisfactory peace or fought an unsuccessful battle. The most able
and successful politician of his time, and thoroughly unscrupulous
about using his power for his own ends, he yet died in a position
less personally important than any that he had occupied during the
thirty-five years of his reign, and, on the whole, less powerful than
he began. Yet if we could distinguish between the man and the Contrast
king, between personal selfishness and official or political statesman- personal and
ship, between the ruin of his personal aims and the real success of tivTsuo-™
his administrative conceptions, we might conclude by saying that c
altogether he was great and wise and successful.

In so mixed a character it would be strange if partial judges could variety of
not find much to praise and much to blame. In the eyes of a friend upon the
the abilities of Henry excuse his vices, and the veriest experiments Henry u. °
of political sagacity wear the aspect of inventions of profound constftu-
philanthropic devotion. To the enemy the same measures are the t:
transparent disguise of a crafty and greedy spirit anxious only for
selfish aggrandisement. The constitutional historian cannot help
looking with reverence on one under whose hand the foundations of
liberty and national independence were so clearly marked and so
deeply laid that in the course of one generation the fabric was safe
for ever from tyrants or conquerors. The partisan of ecclesiastical the

.,..,. • i • ecclesiastic,

immunities or monastic discipline can see in him only the apostate
and the persecutor. The pure moralist inclines to scrutinise per- ana tj?e
sonal vices and to give too little credit to political merit. It is by
such that the character of Henry has for the most part been written.

1 ' Pacis publicae studiosissimus.' W Giraldus, De Inst. Pr. ii. 3. Yet it

Newb. iii. 26. was justice that he sold.

- ' Inter ipsos triumphales eventus 4 It was no mere flattery when the

ummam clementiam . . . conser- author of the Dialogus de Scaccario

vavit.' Gir. Camb. De. Inst. Pr. ii. 8. called him ' Rex illustris mundanorum

3 ' Justitiaa venditor et dilator.' priucipum maxime,' p. 2 (ed. 1711).

94

THE CHRONICLE OF THE REIGNS

Rii charac-
ter M
interpreted

by l.'-t-Tv

Ambition
not big rul-
ing passion ;
but rather
the desire of
consolidat-
ing his
power

This great
purpose not
liable to be
thwarted by
his passion*

Whilst we accept the particulars in which they agree, we may, with-
out pretending to be free from prejudice, attempt to draw from our
own survey of his acts a more probable theory of the man and of his
work on the age and nation.

Interpreted by the history of his acts, the main purpose of
Henry's life is clear. That was the consolidation of the kingly
power in his own hands. Putting aside the disproportioned estimate
of his ambition formed by contemporary writers, and encouraged
perhaps by some careless or ostentatious words of his own,1 we see
in that purpose no very towering idea of conquest, or shortsighted
appetite for tyranny. If ambition were ever really his ruling
passion, it was one which he concealed so well that its definite
object cannot be guessed, which at an early period of his reign he
must have dismissed as impracticable, and which never led him to
forego by precipitate ardour one of the advantages that might be
secured by delay and moderation. He may have had such an aim,
he may have thought of the empire,2 or that the deliverance of
Spain or Palestine was reserved for his arms ; but that he really did
so we have not the most shadowy evidence. We know that he was
a powerful, unscrupulous man, a man of vast energy and industry,
of great determination, the last man in the world to be charged with
infirmity of purpose ; but we also know that he knew mankind and
had read history, and we see that as the actual results of his plans
were of no immoderate dimensions, so also the details of his designs
were carried out with a care and minuteness only credible on the
supposition that they were ends in themselves. We *need not
suppose gratuitously that he intended to base on the foundation of
consolidated power a fabric of conquest that would demand half a
dozen lives to complete.

Such a theory as I -have stated at once gives him a fitting aim
for a moderate sensible ambition, and explains the relation between
the influences of passion and policy by which he was actually

1 ' Solet quippe, quonism ex abun-
dantia cordis OB loquitur, animosum
pariter et ambitiosuin ooram privatis
suis nonnunquam verbum emittere
" totum videlicet mundum uni probo
potentique viro parum esse." ' Qir.
Camb. De Inst. Prin. ii. 1.

* ' Verum ad Romanorum im-
perium, occasione werroo diutinaa et
inexorabilis discordiae inter impera-
torera Fredericum et suos obortoe, tarn
ab Italia tota quam urbe Romnlea
ssepius invitatuK, coniparata quidem
sibi ad hoc Morianae vallis et Alpium
via, Bed non emcaciter obtenta, ani-

mositate sua ambitam eitendit.'
Gir. Camb. De Inst. Pr. ii. 1. This
is a curious passage taken in con-
nexion with the statement of Peter of
Blois, Ep. 118. ' Vidimus et pnesentes
fuimus, ubi regnum Palestine, regnum
etiam Italia-, patri vestro aut uni
tilioruin suorum, quern ad hoc eligeret,
ab utriusque regni magnatibua et
populis est oblatum.' A design of
seizing Aix-la-Chapelle and the empire
itself had been at one time ascribed to
the Conqueror, in 1074. Lambert
Heraf., ed. Piatorius, p. 377.

OF HENRY II. AND KICHARD I. 95

swayed. His moral character, his self-will and self-indulgence, his
licentious habits, his paroxysms of rage, his covetousness, faithless-
ness, and cruelty, did not come into any violent collision with his
political schemes, or if they threatened to do so were kept (except
perhaps in the single exception of the forest laws) in abeyance until

the pressing necessity of policy was satisfied. That they were so wiu.-re tins
.-i n V 11 -IT • iii -in purpose did

restrained proves that this leading purpose is not to be regarded as not interfere

imaginary. That they did sway him on almost every recorded ^rymiJSj84
occasion of his life in which they did not clash with his purpose is bv i"lssion
so certain as to prevent us from listening for a moment to any
theory which would represent him as a beneficent, unselfish ruler.
His ambition may not have been the one which his moral character
and circumstances might lead us to expect ; but to say this is
merely to repeat that that character was rather a compound of in-
consistent qualities than a balance of opposing forces.

Take for example his relations with France, the conquest of He cannot
which is the only conceivable and was the most feasible object of t<f conquer
the ambition with which he may be credited. In such a purpose his fnmc
passions and his unscrupulous policy would have run in the utmost
harmony — pride, passion, revenge, the lust of dominion, the love of
power. He hated Lewis the Seventh, he had every right to hate
him, both as injurer and as injured. He was more or less at
variance with him as long as he lived ; he knew him to be weak and
contemptible, and yet to be the source of all his own deepest
unhappiness. At many periods of his reign Lewis and France lay
at his mercy. The net of alliances was spread all around him.
Italy, Spain, Flanders, were in close alliance with Henry. From
1168 to 1180 the position of Henry the Lion in Germany was such
as must have prevented Lewis from looking for any help from the
house of Hohenstauf en, even if he and the emperor had not been the
champions of rival popes. If the king of England and ruler of half m* amw-

, . -. , , , . tion more

of France abstained from taking what a man of vulgar ambition moderate

would have taken, what Edward III. and Henry V. nearly succeeded Edward m.

in taking, we are not indeed to ignore other possible reasons for °
his forbearance, but the most probable reason is that he did not
want it.

Such possible reasons may be suggested, but for the most part I'-^ibie

* *• rcjisons for

they are much too weak to stand before a resolute passionate restraining
ambition, and the certainty that they must have occurred to so bition m
clear-headed a man as Henry tells that the ambition they served to FiunoT °'
restrain could not have been of such a nature, if it existed at all ;
but it is needless to speculate upon them. Unscrupulous as men
were, the idea of unrighteous conquest from a Christian prince did
not enter into the ordinary morality of the age. They fought for

96

THE CHRONICLE OF THE REIGNS

Henry'*
external
aims

The oon-
aoliclation
of hi*
continental
dominions

Hi* proce-
dure rather
politic than
openly

aggressive

the settlement of quarrels, or for the decision of doubtful claims, or
for rivalry, or for the love of war, hut not for illegal conquest. In
Henry's own wars this fact is clear, he never waged a war but on
the ground of a legal claim. Further than this, his own feudal
superstition, if it is not worthy of a higher name, with regard to the
person of Lewis, was so strong as to exercise a visible restraint on
his actual hatred. His political common sense might well have told
him that the force which was enough to crush Lewis was not strong
enough to hold France. The difficulties he experienced in ruling
the dominions which he already possessed, and the variety of
nationalities already crowded under one sceptre, were considerations
that could not have escaped him, and they were just the considera-
tions which, powerless before the lust of dominion, would commend
themselves most forcibly to his characteristic caution.

The real object of Henry's external ambition was the consolida-
tion of his dominions. To effect this but a moderate extension was
necessary. These dominions on the continent were a long territory
of varying breadth, the cohesion of which was of course weakest at
its narrowest part. The reduction of Brittany from the condition of
nominal to that of real dependence, and the extinction of any
formidable power in Angoumois, La Marche, Saintonge, and
Limousin, were necessary for the maintenance of the desired unity
of estates. Second in importance was the enforcement of feudal
claims over Toulouse and Auvergne, which might be more useful as
independent allies than as unwilling vassals. The recovery of the
Vexin and the establishment of Eleanor's rights over Berry gave a
strength to the frontier and an apparent compactness to the mass ;
but these, like Brittany, Henry chose to secure by marriages rather
than by arms ; and in the same way the only considerable acquisi-
tion which he contemplated was attempted in the abortive proposal
for the marriage of John with the heiress of Savoy and Maurienne.

In the pursuit of his object Henry went to work very much in
the way in which a rich man in the eighteenth century created an
estate and founded a family.1 He was anxious to increase the mass
of his inheritance and his local influence by advantageous marriages
and judicious purchases. He was scarcely less anxious to extinguish
copyholds and buy up small interloping freeholders. In the choice
of his acquisitions, that stood first in his consideration which could
be brought within a ring fence. If Henry II. occasionally had
recourse to chicanery - and oppression, he has not wanted followers

1 For instance, his purchase of the
county of La Marche in 1177. B.
de Monte ad ami., and R. S. ed vol. i.
p. 197. R. de Diceto, 600.

1 ' Omne jus poli jure fori deniu-
tavit. Scripta authentica omnium
enervavit.' ' Haareditates retinuit aut
vendidit.' R. Niger, 169.

OF HENRY II. AND RICHARD I. 97

on both a large and a small scale whom his moderation even in these
points might put to shame.

The character of his insular acquisitions was determined on a His policy in
similar principle. Wales, Ireland, and Scotland were all desirable
conquests, but no great cost should be spent on them. If internal
divisions could be turned to profit, or if the scheme of aggression
could be made available for the diversion of uneasy spirits from
home, Henry was ready to take advantage of the circumstances, but
would not waste much treasure or many men. In each of these The legal
cases he had a legal claim ; to Ireland by the gift of Pope Adrian IV. ; aggression*
to Scotland and Wales by his inheritance of the ancient supremacy
of the Anglo-Saxon kings, and the simple application of feudal
principles to that inheritance. The case with regard to Ireland was
even stronger, if we consider him as succeeding to the like ancient
claim to supremacy, and as at once the nominee of the sovereign of
all islands l and the invited arbiter of domestic quarrels. Yet,
according to Eobert de Monte, the original design upon Ireland was
formed for the purpose of finding a kingdom for William Longespee
of Anjou, and the final conquest was carried out in order to provide
a suitable settlement for John.2 William the Lion and David of
North Wales were reconciled by a royal or < quasi-royal marriage.3
Galloway was not attacked until a like bond had proved too slight
or too frail to hold it.

Henry's division of his dominions among his sons was a measure HIS distri-
which, as his own age did not understand it, later ones may be dominions,13
excused for mistaking ; but the object of it was, as may be inferred
from his own recorded words, to strengthen and equalise the pressure
of the ruling hand in different provinces of various laws and
nationalities.4 The sons were to be the substitutes, not the suc-
cessors of their father ; the eldest as the accepted or elected sharer

1 See the Bull ' Laudabiliter,' Gir. Gemblours ad 1156 : ' Exercitum . . .
Camb. De Inst. Pr. ii. 19. 'Sane quern proposuerat ducere in Hiberniam
Hiberniam et omnes insulas quibus ut earn suo dominio subjugaret et
sol justitisa Christus illuxit, . . . fratremque suum concilio episcoporum
ad jus beati Petri et sacrosanctse et religiosorum virorum illi insulse
Romanse ecclesise . . . non est regem constituent.' See also Alberic
dubium pertinere." By a misinter- of Trois Fontaines, ad 1156, ed.
pretation of the forged donation of Leibnitz, p. 329.

Constantine. 3 Emma, the bastard daughter of

2 Ad ann. 1155. ' Circa festum Geoffrey Plantagenet, was married to
Sancti Michaelis Henricus rex An- David, prince of North Wales, in
glorum, habito concilio apud Win- 1174. R. de Diceto, 585.

oestrum de conquirendo regno 4 ' Addens etiam in illo mandate

Hiberniee et Guillelmo fratri suo quod quando ipse solus erat in regi-

dando, cum optimatibus suis tractavit. m ne regni nihil de jure amittebat, et

Quod quia matri ejus imperatrici non modo dedecus esset cum sint plures in

placuit intermissa est ad tempus ilia regenda terra aliquid inde perdere.'
expeditio.' Cf. Cont. Anslem of

98

THE CHRONICLE OF THE REIOKS

Hi- irruii.I
position In
Europe

What a
crusade he
might have
ted

Hla home
policy deter-
mined by
the game
ruling
principle

of the royal name, as feudal superior to his brothers, and first in the
royal councils, stood in the same relation to his father as the king
of the Romans to the emperor ; he might rule with a full delegated
power, or perhaps with inchoate independence, but the father's hand
was to guide the helm of state. Unhappily the young brood of the
eagle of the broken covenant were the worst possible instruments
for the working of a large and complex policy ; the last creatures in
the world to be made useful in carrying on a form of government
which the experience of all ages has tried and found wanting.

Yet how grand a scheme of western confederation might be
deduced from the consideration of the position of Henry's children,
how great a dream of conquest may after all have been broken by
the machinations of Lewis and Eleanor ! What might not a
crusade have effected headed by Henry II., with his valiant sons,
the first warriors of the age, with his sons-in-law Henry the Lion,
William of Sicily, and Alfonso of Castile ; with Philip of France,
the brother-in-law of his sons, Frederick Barbarossa, his distant
kinsman and close ally, the princes of Champagne and Flanders, his
cousins? In it the grand majestic chivalry of the emperor, the
wealth of Sicily, the hardy valour and practical skill of Spain, the
hereditary crusading ardour of the land of Godfrey of Bouillon and
Stephen of Blois, the statesmanlike vigour and simple piety of the
great Saxon hero, under the guidance of the craft and sagacity, the
mingled impetuosity and caution of Henry II., might have presented
Europe to Asia in a guise which she has never yet assumed. Yet
all the splendour of the family confederation, all the close-woven
widespread web that fortune and sagacity had joined to weave, end
in the cruel desertion, the baffled rage, the futile curses of the chained
leopard in the last scene at Chinon. The lawful sons, the offspring,
the victims, and the avengers of a heartless policy,1 the loveless
children of a loveless mother, have left the last duties of an affection
they did not feel to the hands of a bastard, the child of an early,
obscure, misplaced, degrading, but not a mercenary love.

The same idea of consolidating the kingly power is apparent in the
legal and social measures of Henry II. His position was in these
respects, indeed, more fortunate than in his foreign relations. He
had not here to originate a policy which was to unite heterogeneous
provinces, but inherited the experience of a century, the able
ministers of his grandfather, and the plans which had been initiated
in the reigns of William the Conqueror and William Rufus. But
it certainly is not in the power of an 'ordinary administrator to adapt
and develop the ideas of others, and embody them in a policy of his

See Oiraldns Camb. De Inst. Pr. ii. 3 ; and William of Newbnrgb, iii. 26.

OF HENRY II. AND RICHARD I. 99

own. What credit Henry loses for originality he more than recovers
when we consider the energy, skill, and industry with which he
pursued his main object.

The bent of his internal policy may be described as the substitu- The exact
tion of the king's government for the state of things which had pouoyfth
prevailed more or less ever since the Conquest, which was partly
coeval with the existence of the Norman race, partly owing to the
incrustation of feudal institutions ; against which the Conqueror had The creation
had to struggle, which William Kufus had to repress by the strong central0"1
hand, which Henry I. by dint of time and skill had but in a degree g
weakened, and which had regained in the anarchy of Stephen's
reign all the power that it had lost under his predecessor.

The idea of a kingly government administered by the king's Thegovem-
servants, in which the action of the feudal nobility where it existed by the king
was simply ministerial, and was not, so far as the executive was ministers,
concerned, even necessary to the maintenance of the plan, was the thTfraadiig
true remedy for the evils of anarchy inherent in the Norman state7, element
Such a system could not be devised by a weak or ambitious head,
or worked by feeble or indolent hands. Nor could it be brought to
maturity or to easy action in one man's lifetime. The elements of
discord were not extinguished in -Henry's reign ; they broke out
whenever any other trouble distracted the king's energy or divided
Ms power. Still he was in the main successful, and left to his
successors the germ of a uniform administration of justice and
system of revenue. His ministers, who at the beginning of his
reign were little more than officers of his household, at the end of it
were the administrators of the country.1 The position of England
in the affairs of Europe was, from this time, owing, not to the foreign
possessions of the sovereign, but to the compactness of her organisa-
tion, and the facility with which the national strength and resources
could be handled.

It does not matter much whether we consider the several measures character of
of Henry's administrative reforms as parts of a matured definite of Henry's
scheme, or as the expedients and experiments of an adroit manager, government:
The more carefully we study the remaining monuments of the earlier caur^xperi-
reigns, or the character. of Henry's ministers, the more we may be mental?

1 This great extension of the power ending of Henry II.'s reign With

and importance of the king's ministers regard to the lay official, the contrast

during the reign has frequently been isTnore significant, because the aggran-

remarked in the case of the chancellor. disement is personal rather than

Yet the difference of the position of official. The constable, on the other

Henry I.'s chancellors as compared hand, seems to have retained some of

with that of Becket and Longchamp the prestige of the position of the

is trifling compared with the position Stallere from earlier times,
of the marshal at the beginning and

H'2

100

THE CHRONICLE OF THE REIGNS

i of his
character
drawn from
the exami-
nation of
his system.
(1) Was he
a tyrant ?

convinced that his genius was rather adaptive and digestive than
originative. When on the other hand we examine the actual results
of his reforms as exemplified in the succeeding reigns, the more
certainly we see the difference between the earlier fragmentary
attempts at legislation and the definite system which Henry left
behind him ; but on any view the industry, energy, and readiness
of his working were qualities of the man himself.

TWO It is obvious that Henry's great design as well as the subordinate

parts of it may, taken apart from the general tenour of his character,
be read in two ways, or rather that two opposing views of his
character may be drawn from the bare consideration of his objects
and measures. It may seem that he wished to create a tyranny, to
overthrow every vestige of independence among the clergy and nobles,
and to provide himself from the proceeds of taxation with means of
carrying out personal selfish designs. He might be a man who
could endure no opposition, and to whom it was enough to make a
thing intolerable that it should be originated by any other than
himself. Such a reading would explain much of his avarice, cruelty,
and greediness in acquiring territory.

Or it might be argued that as so many of his schemes did actually
result in the amelioration of the condition of his subjects, as his
judicial reforms were the basis on which the next generation was
enabled to raise the earlier stages of civil liberty ; and as his
ecclesiastical measures have in nearly every particular been sanc-
tioned and adopted by the practice of later ages, he is therefore
entitled to the praise of a well-intentioned, benevolent ruler, as well
as to the credit of a far-sighted statesman.

Both of these views have been advocated, the first by some of
his contemporaries, and those who in later times have approached
the history from their point of prejudice ; the latter by those who,
both anciently and recently, have been inclined to look with too
professional an eye on the character of his reforms. I have stated
already that I think neither of them tenable ; and as it is at present
Henry's personal character that is before me, I will give the
reasons.

As to the first theory, which, in the mouths of his contemporaries,
seems so condemnatory, it must be said that gratuitous baseness
was no part of Henry's character, if we may judge by his actions.
He was thoroughly unscrupulous and unprincipled, but he was not
a tyrant ; he was not wantonly cruel or oppressive. His crimes
I against public law and order, such as they were, were not purposeless,
nor is it in any way necessary to suppose that he had that intolerance
of all opposition which pursues tyranny for its own sake. He had
definite aims, and followed them unrelentingly ; whatever could be

(8) Was he a
benefactor ?

or (8) a far-
sighted
statesman ?

None of
these views
tenable

(1) Neither
in policy nor
in character
WM he n
despot

OF HENRY II. AND RICHARD I.

101

made to minister to their furtherance was forced to its use. As hia
passions gave way to his policy, so the minor measures of his policy
were sometimes compelled to give way to the occasional exigencies
of his great design. But where there was no definite object he was
not a tyrant.

The theory that he was a benevolent governor or a far-sighted
statesman is not supported, either by the apparent purpose of his
reforms, or by their actual result. It requires no particular
benevolence to teach a king that his subjects are more contented
when justice is fairly administered than when violence reigns
unrepressed ; and that where they are contented they are more
likely to be industrious, and more able to pay taxes ; that where
they have more at stake they are more ready to make sacrifices to
purchase security ; but this is no lesson of far-sighted statesmanship,
for it is the simplest principle of the art of government. If there
were any sign of benevolence, any glimpse of the love of his people
apparent in his actions, he ought by all means to have the credit of
it ; if there were any such general tone in his private life it might
be allowed to give the key of interpretation of his public life, and a
harmony to his whole character. But his life was violent and
lawless ; his personal design, wherever it clashed with his established
measures, set them at once aside.

Again, such parts of his system as have been approved by the voice
of late posterity, such as, especially, the restrictions on papal power
and on ecclesiastical immunities, are capable of very simple discussion.
There is no need to enter into a question of the personal merit of
S. Thomas of Canterbury, or of the exact point for which he held
out, and for which, in fact, he perished. We may respect the stout-
heartedness of the prelate without approving his cause, or we may
approve his cause without shutting our eyes to the violent and
worldly spirit in which he conducted it ; but when we find that in
this cause all the piety and wisdom of three centuries saw the
championship of Divine truth and justice against secular usurpation,
we are not surely wrong in supposing that the Constitutions of
Clarendon were dated three centuries too soon. Was Henry really
three centuries before his age ? If the answer is affirmative, we
deny his character as a statesman, and reduce him to a theorist.
In truth, it was as ancient customs ' that he wished to restore them,
not to force them as innovations. His mistake was not that he
anticipated the age of the Reformation, but that he neglected to
consider that such was the rapid progress of papal assumption, and

(2) He was
selfish tobe
benefactor

Uniform
of Henry IT.

not a theo-
cannot"

f0rlfar-red
S1&htedness

1 ' Avitas consuetudines.' . Gerv.
1385. ' Leges avi mei Henrici regis
recordatffi et conscript® publice coram

omnibus recitentur ne novum aliquid
tradidisse quisquam nobis prsesumat
imponere.' Grim. S. T. C. i. 31.

102

THE CHRONICLE OF THE REIGNS

The differ-
ence of bin

againxt
feudal and
against ec-
nfiiriiitli nl
usurpation
regpectlyely

Though not
a tyrant, he
would have
been If it
had been
necessary

The desire
to create
a strong
government
no proof of
tyrannical
designs,
or of a
despotic
spirit

Constitu-
tional

government
still In
embryo

Hiibad
point*
brought out
by opposi-
tion

its acceptance, both in England and on the continent, since the age
of Hildebrand, that his ' ancestral rights ' were really left high and
dry behind the advancing flood which he vainly thought to stem.
The policy to which feudal antiquity had been forced to yield was
really powerless against the increasing tide of ecclesiastical authority.
The point which eluded the sagacity of Henry was identical with
that which the Conqueror himself had overlooked when he established
ecclesiastical courts to take cognisance of the secular offences of the
clergy. Both saw the impossibility of reconciling royal supremacy
with the claims of feudal antiquity; but in ecclesiastical matters
William yielded to, or perhaps helped on, the first trickling of the
stream which Henry had to withstand in its full force. It was as
necessary to William to strengthen as it was to Henry to weaken
the power of the clergy. Henry should not have expected to find in
Becket one who would at once fill the seat and reverse the measures
of Lanfranc.

In his secular and ecclesiastical reforms alike, he had an object
to gain which demanded unusual measures ; and he, without
scruple and without remorse, tried to enforce them by all means, fair
and foul. If he was not a mere tyrant, he was a man who was never
deterred by any considerations but those of expediency from trying to
win his game.

It seems, then, that there is a third and a truer reading of this
eventful life, one which makes no demand on our credulity like the
second, and which requires no harsh construction of simple actions
like the first. Henry wished to create, at home and abroad, a
strong government. In this itself there was nothing deserving the
name of tyrannical ; at the worst it was less of a tyranny than that
which had been in use in the three Norman reigns, and had been
exercised on both sides in the contests of that of Stephen. As
governments were in those days, any might be accounted good
which was conducted on the principle of law, not on caprice. The
notions of constitutional sovereignty and liberty were still locked up
in the libraries, or in embryo in the brains of the clergy.

Such a theory makes Henry neither an angel nor a devil. He
was a man of strong nature ; strong will, strong affections, and
strong passions. His ambition was not a wanton one. He began
his reign without any temptation to be oppressive ; but from the
beginning we can read his purpose of being master in his own
house. The humbling of the barons was no hard task ; the
initiation of law and order was an easy consequence ; but the
attempt to apply the principles of law and order to the clergy, in a
way that was not sanctioned by the public opinion of his day, and
which made his ablest counsellor his most inveterate foe, brought

OF HENKY II. AND KICHAED I. 103

up an opposition which called into play all the violence of his
nature. It was not that his character changed, but that circumstances
brought out what was in him in a stronger light. After Becket's
death, the circumstances became even stronger still, and brought
out in a still stronger light the same characteristics.

By that most disastrous event all the elements of opposition Actual
were restored to life. Lewis had now a cause which, to his weak Becket's
and wicked conscience, justified all the meanness and falsehood that n
he could use against his rival. The clergy dared not side with the
king in such a quarrel. The barons took immediate advantage of
the general disaffection. The king's sons lighted the flames of war.
Not, I think, that there is any evidence to show that the death of
S. Thomas was actually or nominally the pretext for revolt ; but it
was a breaking up of the restraints which had so far been effectual ;
and all who had grievances were ready and able to take advantage of
the shock.

Under the circumstances, Henry did not show himself a hero, Henry's
but he behaved as a moderate and politic conqueror. It was not Weighed
revenge, but the restoration of the strength of his government that hJmeth£nh
he desired. He did not break off his plans of reform : year after revenge* of
year saw some wise change introduced into the legal or military ad-
ministration ; and practically he managed the church without any
glaring scandal. He ruled for himself, not for his people ; but he
did not rule cruelly or despotically. His character contained much
that was tyrannical, but his policy was not such as to curse him
with the name of tyrant.1

Is Henry, then, to have no credit for his sagacious measures ? what credit
Yes ; the credit due to a man who, having come to his crown with him ?
a power limited by circumstances rather than by law, and having
overcome those circumstances, has chosen to sacrifice somewhat of
the licence of despotism for the safety of order ; has chosen to place
his power on the basis of public security and common justice.2
Such merit was his, although, doubtless, the love of power was
stronger in him than the love of order. His wisdom was not less
wisdom because it was the wisdom of a selfish man.

In the elaborate descriptions of Henry II. which are given by Can the por-
Peter of Blois, Giraldus Cambrensis, and Ralph Niger, we cannot of him' by

doubt that we have the accurate delineation of the man as he

harmonised?

1 B. de Die. 578. totum in hoc direxit animum ut paci

2 ' Illustris Anglorum rex Henricus rebellantes et dyscolos multiplici sub-
hoc nomine participantium regum versions conteret, et pacis ac fidei
secundus dictus est, sed nulli moder- bonum in cordibus hominum modis
norum fuisse creditur in rebus com- omnibus consignaret.' Dial, de Scacc.
ponendis aninii virtute secundus : ab p. 38.

ipso enim susa dominationis exordio

104

THE CHRONICLE OF THE REIGNS

He doe* not
look like a
hero

Abstract of
the charac-
ters given
by oontem-

appeared through the different mediums of liking and dislike. The
main lines of the portraits are the same, though they are seen as it
were through variously-coloured glass. They are well-marked and
defined, as we might expect in the most superficial view of such a
man. But although well-marked and strongly defined, they do not
combine, even under the hand of a professed panegyrist, into the
outlines of a hero.

We see a hard-headed, industrious, cautious,1 subtle,3 restless
man ; fixed in purpose, versatile in expedients ; wonderfully rapid
in execution ; great in organising, without being himself methodical ;
one who will always try to bind others, whilst leaving himself free ; 8
who never prefers good faith to policy or appearances to realities ;
who trusts rather to time and circumstances than to the goodwill of
others ; by inclination parsimonious and retiring, but on occasion
lavish and magnificent ; liberal in almsgiving,4 splendid in building,5
but not giving alms without an ulterior object, nor spending money
on buildings, except where he can get his money's worth. As with
treasure, so with men, he was neither extravagant nor sparing ; rather
economical than humane ; pitiful after the slaughter of battle, but
not chary of human life where it could be spent with effect.6

He had the one weakness of great minds, without which no man
ever reached greatness : never to be satisfied without doing or taking
part himself in everything that was to be done ; 7 and he had not what

1 ' Omnia prius quam arma per-
tentans.' Gir. Camb. ' Martios con-
gressus quoad potuit semper evitans."
Ib. iii. 24.

2 His dissimulation is a great point
with Becket. 8. T. C. iii. 63, 140, 225.
No one who ever had anything to do
with him escaped his mousetraps
(muscipulas). Epp. Cant. 260. Ten-
diculas, 8. T. C. iii. 302. He was a
complete Proteus. 8. T. C. iii. 302.

' 'Naturali q,uadam inconstantia,
verbi plerumque spontaneus trans-
gressor; nam quoties res in arctum
devenerat, de dicto malens quam de
mcto pwnitere, verbumque facilius
quam factum irritum habere.' Gir.
Camb.

4 ' Incomparabilis eleemosynarum
largitor et praecipuus terra Palestine
sustentator.' Gir. Camb. Cf. Dial, de
Scacc. p. 2. See his will in Giraldus,
De Inst. Pr. ii. 17; also Ralph de
Diceto, 613 ; Gervase, 1459.

The orders of Grammont and Font-
evraud were his favourites, as the
Cluniac was of Henry I. and the Cis-

tercian of Richard I. The monks of
Fontevraud registered him in their
obituary as ' secundus probitate
Alexander, alter Salomon scientia,'
Note on Ralph of Coggeshall in Bou-
quet.

s 'Ad pacem populi special im-
mensitas ilia pecuniarum quam donat,
quam recipit, quam congregat, quam
dispergit. In muris, in propugnaculis,
in munitionibus, in fossatis, in
clausuris ferarum et piscium, et in
palatiorum aedificiis, nullus subtilior,
nullus magnificentior invenitur.1 P.
Bles. See especially the list of his
buildings in R. de Monte, 897, ad ann.
1161.

• ' Amissos in acie plus principe
plangens et humanior exstructo militi
quam superstiti, longeque majori
dolore mortuos lugens quam vivoa
amore dcmulcens.' Gir. Camb.

' Even Richard I., like Napoleon
Bonaparte, complained that he could
not be everywhere. ' Nemo potest esse
ubique.' Itin. R. R. p. 267. R. de
Diceto, 560. ' Per provincias currens

OF HENEY II. AND EICHARD I.

105

may be called the strength of little minds, inability to see good in
what he did not himself devise.

He was eloquent, affable, polite, jocose ; l so persuasive in address
that few could resist the charm of his manner. He had the royal
prerogative of never forgetting names and faces ; 2 he loved to en-
courage the retiring and to repel the presuming.3 He was a most
excellent and bountiful master.4 He was very faithful, both in
friendships and enmities, where they did not interfere with his
policy.8

He was not without elegant tastes ; 6 he loved the reading of His taste
history, delighted in the conversation of acute and learned men like
his uncles the kings of Jerusalem, and his sons-in-law William of
Sicily and Henry of Saxony. He had a wonderful memory,7 well
stored with the lessons of past times, and with the experiences of
constant journeys, on which he was careful to see everything that
was to be seen.

He had little regard for more than the merest forms of religion ; 8 His reiigi-
like Napoleon Bonaparte, he heard mass daily, but without paying
decent attention to the ceremony. During the most solemn part of
the service he was whispering to his courtiers, or scribbling, or look-
ing at pictures.9 His vows to God he seems to have thought might be

explorat facta omnium, illos potissi-
mum judicans quos constituit judices
aliorum.' Pet. Bles.

1 ' Nemo est argutior in consiliis, in
eloquio torrentior.' ' Nullus rege
nostro honestior est in loquendo, in
coniedendo urbanior, moderatior in
bibendo.' P. Bles. ' Princeps eloquen-
tissimus. . . . Vir affabilis, vir
flexibilis et facetus.'

2 ' Quemcunque vel semel in facie
attentius inspexerat, quanquam in
tanta quotidie multitudine constitutus,
nunquam amplius ignotum habebat.'
Gir. Camb.

3 ' Nullus mansuetior est afflictis,
nullus affabilior pauperibus ; nullus
importabilior est superbis

studuit opprimere fastuosos, oppresses
erigere.' Pet. Bles.

4 ' In augendis dignitatibus sibi mili-
tantium semper aspirat.' Dialogus de
Scaccario, p. 30.

5 ' Quern semel dilexit vix dediligit ;
quern vero semel exosum habuit vix in
gratiam familiaritatis admittit.' Pet.
Bles. ' Quern semel exosum habuerat,
vix in amorem, quern semel amaverat
vix in odium revocabat.' Gir. Camb.

6 ' Quoties enim potest a curis et
sollicitudinibus respirare, secreta se

occupat lectione, aut in cuneo cleri-
corum aliquem nodum quaestionis
laborat evolvere : nam cum rex vester
bene [i.e. William of Sicily] litteras
noverit, rex nosterlonge litteratior est
. . . . Verum tamen apud regem
Anglorum quotidiana ejus schola est,
litteratissimorum conversatio jugis,
et discussio qusestionum.1 P. Bles.
' Quod his temporibus conspicuum est,
litteris eruditus . . . Historiarum
omnium fere promptam notitiam et
cunctarum rerum experientiam prope-
rnodum ad manum habebat.'

7 ' Quicquid aliquando memoria
dignum audierat nunquam a mente
decidere poterat.' Gir. Camb.

8 He was occasionally, like John,
violently blasphemous. See Gir.
Camb. de Inst. Pr. iii. 11. He neg-
lected confession, ib. iii. 13.

9 This may be a libel of Kalph
Niger, but it is graphic enough to be
true : ' Oratorium ingressus, pictursa
aut susurro vacabat,' p. 169. Giraldus
says the same, ' Sacrse vix horam
hostise mittenclffi divinisaccommodans,
et id ipsum temporis, ob regni forte
negotia tanta reique public® causa,
plus consiliis et sermone quam devo-
tione consumens.'

106

THE CHRONICLE OF THE REIGNS

!• in • ..

His temper

Abstract of
the contem-
porary
accounts of
his appear -

Hi!* face

and figure

evaded as easily as his covenants with men ; his undertaking to go
on crusade was commuted for money payments, and his promised
religious foundations wore carried out at the expense of others.''
His regard to personal morality was of much the same value and
extent. He was at no period of his life a faithful husband ; and
when he had finally quarrelled with Eleanor he sank into sad depths
of licentiousness.3

He was an able, plausible, astute, cautious, unprincipled man of
business. His temper was violent, and he was probably subject to
the outrageous paroxysms of passion which are attributed to his
Norman ancestors, and which, if they have not been exaggerated by
the historians, must have been fearful proofs of a profane and cruel
disposition, on which discipline had imposed no restraints.3

His personal appearance did not approach the heroic. He was
slightly above the middle height,4 square and substantial, with a
decided tendency to corpulence.6 His head was round, and well
proportioned ; 6 his hair approaching to red, sprinkled in his later
years with white, but always kept very short as a precaution against
baldness.7 His face is described by one authority as fiery,8 by
another as lion-like. His eyes were grey, and full of expression,
but rather prominent, and occasionally bloodshot.9 His nose was

1 ' Ralph Niger's account of this is
very characteristic : ' Juratus se tria
monasteria constructuruni, duos
ordines transvertit, personas de loco
ad locum transfcrens, meretrices alias
ali is, Cenomannicas Anglicis sub-
stituens.' This of course refers to the
Ainesbury transaction. The Waltham
one was of much the same kind.
Giraldus also is severe on this very
shabby business, and is unable to say
what the third monastery was by the
construction of which his vow was
fulfilled, unless it were the Charter-
house at Witham. De Inst. Pr. ii. 7.

2 Ralph Niger says that he im-
prisoned Eleanor that she might not
interfere with his amours (p. 168).
He says also of him, ' Corruptor pudi-
citiae et avum sequens in flagitiis, prinio
in sponsas, post in filias procerum
illecebras exercens.' Giraldus says
that after Eleanor's imprisonment,
' qui adulter antea fnerat occultus,
effectus postea manifestos, non mundi
quidem rosa, juxta falsam et frivolam
nominis impositionem, sed immundi
verius rosa vocata, palam et impu-
dentius abutendo ' ; a statement which
settles two traditionary statements
about Rosamond, namely, that she was

the mother of Geoffrey, who was born
about 1158, and that she was put out
of the way by Eleanor. Walter de
Mapes says that Geoffrey's mother was
a low woman named Ykenay.

1 Of. 8. T. C. iv. 260.,

4 ' Statura ejus mediocris est, ut
et inter parvos magnus appareat, nee
inter majores minimus videatur.' Pet.
Bles. ep. 66. Henry and Richard were
taller than their father, John and
Geoffrey shorter. Gir. Camb. ii. 29.

1 ' Corpore carnoso . . . ventre
peramplo.' Giraldus Camb.

* 'Amplo capite et rotundo.' Gir.
Camb. ' Caput ejus sphasricum,' ' at
collo et toti corpori proportional!
moderatione respondeat.' Pet. Bles.

7 'Subrufus.' Gir. Camb. • Sub-
rufum . . . nisi quia colorem huno
venerabilis senectus et superveniens
canities aliquantulum alteravit.' Pet.
Bles. ' Csesaries ejus damna calvi-
tiei non veretur, superveniente tamen
artificii capillorum tonsura.' Ibid.

• 'Facie ipnea.' Gir. Camb. 'Leo-
nina facies quasi in quadrangulum se
diktat.' Pet. Bles.

' ' Oculis glaucis, ad iram torvis et
rubore stiff us is.' Gir. Camb. ' Oculi
ejus orbiculati aunt; dum pacati est

OF HENRY II. AND KICHARD I. 107

well formed, and denoted no more pride or fastidiousness than was
becoming to a king.1

He had a short bull neck,2 a broad square chest,3 the arms of a
boxer,4 and the legs of a horseman 5 (the author does not say whether
of a groom or a cavalier). His feet were highly arched,6 but his
hands were clumsy and coarse.7

He paid very little attention to dress,8 and never wore gloves His personal
but when he went hawking. He took a great deal of exercise,
being both restless by habit and anxious to keep down his tendency
to fat. He was a great hunter and hawker ; 9 he never sat except
at meals or on horseback.10 He transacted all business standing,
greatly to the detriment of his legs. He was very moderate in both
meat and drink,11 cared very little for appearances, loved order in
others without observing it himself ; he was a good and kind master,
who chose his servants well, but neither trusted them too much, nor
ever forgave their neglect of his interests.

The picture is not a pleasant one ; in spite of his refined taste General
and his polite address he must have looked generally like a rough, derived10"
passionate, uneasy man. But his frame, though not elegant, was from these'
very serviceable, qualified him for great exertion, and was proof
against privation or fatigue. He was an adroit and formidable man
at arms, but there was little at first sight to denote either the
courteous knight or the skilful general, or the self-possessed intriguer,
or the ingenious organiser, or the versatile administrator, or the
profound politician.

animi columbini et simplices, sed in 10 ' Semper a mane usque ad ves-

ira et turbatione cordis quasi scintil- peram stat in pedes, et licet tibias

lantes ignem et in impetu f ulminantes.' habeat frequenti percussione calci-

Pet. Bles. trantium equorum enormiter vulne-

1 Pet. Bles. ratas et lividas, nisi tamen equitet vel

2 ' Collo ab humeris aliquantulum comedat, nunquam sedet.' Pet. Bles.
demisso." Gir. Camb. So also Gir. Camb. ' Cum tibiarum

* ' Pectore quadrato." Gir. Camb. pedumque tumore frequenti . . . cffi-

' Thorax extensior.' Pet. Bles. teras id ipsum corporis incommodi-

4 'Brachiis validis." Gir. Camb. tates accelerabat.'
' Lacerti pugiles.' Pet. Bles. " Caro siquidem ejus se mole

6 ' Equestres tibiae.' Pet. Bles: pinguedinis enormiter onerasset, nisi
8 ' Arcuati pedes.' Pet. Bles. quia ventris insolentiam jejuniis et

7 ' Manus ejus quadam grossitie exercitio domat.' Pet. Bles. • Erat
sua hominis incuriam protestantur ; enim cibo potuque modestus ac sobrius.
earum enim cultum prorsus negligit, . . . Pacis quoque tempore sibi nee
nee unquam nisi aves deferat utitur pacem ullam nee requiem indulgebat ;
chirothecis.' Pet. Bles. venationi enim trans modestiam

8 ' Ocreis sine plica, pileis sine fastu, deditus, summo diluculo equo cursore
et vestibus utitur expeditis.' Pet. transvectus, nunc saltus lustrans,
Bles. nunc montium juga transcendens dies

9 ' Semper in manibus ejus sunt ducebat inquietos ; vespere vero do-
arcus, enses, venabula, sagittae.' Pet. mum receptum, vel ante ccenam vel
Bles. post, rarissime sedentem conspexeris.'

108

THE CHRONICLE OF THE REIGNS

Importance
of his
podtion in
WliBh
hlntory

Period of

;iiii:i!

tioo

Possible

sp< vu hit in] i
on national
character

Self-reli-
ance, the
character
produced by
Anglo-Saxon
institutions

But if the character of Henry contained none of the elements of
real greatness, if the leading principle of it was one which is actually
incompatible with the highest degree of excellence in a ruler, the
position of the nation he governed was such, and the influence
exercised upon it by his character and the events of his reign was so
salutary, as to make him one of the most conspicuous actors in the
drama of English history. He was a link in the chain of great men
by whom, through good and evil, the English nation was drawn on
to constitutional government. He was the man the time required.
It was a critical time, and his actions and policy determined the
crisis in a favourable way. He stands with Alfred, Canute, William
the Conqueror, and Edward I., one of the conscious creators of
English greatness.

His reign was the period of amalgamation,1 the union of the
different elements existing in the country, which, whether it be
looked on as chemical or mechanical, produced the national character
and the national institutions.

If there is really such a thing as national character, we may
speculate thus. The Anglo-Saxon temperament had run to seed
in the age preceding the Conquest. The efforts of Canute, directed
to the thorough union of the Danish with the Anglo-Saxon
population, had ended as such efforts general do, in the assimilation
of the smaller to the larger constituent in the union of the kindred
races. The Danish provinces had become before the Conquest
scarcely distinguishable from the Anglo-Saxon, as far as concerned
national feeling, and the more important questions of law and
manners. What differences yet remained served to intensify the
weakness which was inherent in the character of the mass.

The tendency of all the Anglo-Saxon institutions was to produce
a spirit of self-dependence ; that was the strength of the system.
Its weakness was the want of cohesion, which is a necessary condi-
tion of particles incapable of self-restraint in the absence of any
external force to compress them. The power of combination was
not indeed wanting, but it was exercised only in very small aggrega-
tions, for very small purposes, and those private rather than national.
The allodial system left the owner of land dependent on no earthly
lord. The principle of combination in gilds and tithings, which to a
certain extent was voluntary, on the one hand, and the system of
commendation, which was entirely so, on the other, supplied a very

1 ' Jam cohabitantibus Anglicis et
Normannis et alterutrum uxorea
ducentibus vel nubentibus, sic per-
mixtffi sunt nationes ut viz discern!
possit hodie, de liberis loquor, quis
Anglicus, quis Normannus sit genere ;

exccptis duntaxat ascriptitiis qu
villani dicuntur, quibus non est
liberum obstantibus dominis suis a
sui status conditionr disccdcre.' Dia-
logus, d*c., p. 26.

OF HEKRY II. AND EICHAED I. 109

indifferent means of national union. The unity of the tithing was
far closer than that of the hundred ; that of the hundred than that self-reliance
of the county ; that of the county, or of the district governed by the extreme,0 a
same law, was far stronger than that of the kingdom. Self-reliance lossVnhe6
in great and small alike, without self-restraint, without the power £oS>0n
of combination, with a national pride and yet no national spirit, laid
England an easy though unwilling prey at the feet of the Conqueror.
Hating to submit, it was yet unable to unite except in the same
small clusters in which throughout its early history the nation had
exhausted its power of cohesion ; hence the special character of the
struggles which occupied the early years of William's reign.

For such a condition the feudal system was undoubtedly the The feudal
fitting cure. There is much truth, though only half the truth, in hdpedto
Mr. Carlyle's observation that the pot-bellied equanimity of the
Anglo-Saxon needed the drilling and discipline of a century of
Norman tyranny. The grinding process by which the machinery of ft
feudalism forced into a common mass all the different interests, soundness of
desires, and habits of the disunited race was, however, only one part
of its operation. The feudal system was very far from being
altogether bad. Like the Holy Alliance, it would have been a very
excellent device if it could have been administered by angels ; and
all Norman nobles were by no means such men as William Eufus or
Robert of Bellesme. The essence of the system was mutual fidelity,
and its proper consequence the creation of a corporate unity, and the
recognition of it by every member, from the king to the villein.
The bond was not a voluntary one, to be taken up and put aside at
pleasure ; the principle of cohesion was uniform throughout the
mass. If then on the one hand the maladministration of the
system forced the different constituents of the nation into a physical
union of interests, the essential character, which no maladministra-
tion could neutralise, supplied the very elements which were
wanting for moral strength. Self-reliance was proved not to be
incompatible with order, mutual faith, and regard to law ; and these
are indispensable for national strength and national spirit.

It was not, however, necessary that the pressure of this discipline The pressure-
should be perpetual ; it was enough that the lesson should be learned, discipline
and the rod -might be cast aside ; but very much must depend on the po^ryoniy.
treatment applied at the moment. Had the crucible been taken
from the furnace too soon the elements would never have combined ;
if it had been kept there too long the fusion would have ended in an
explosion, or in the formation of an insensate, unductile mass. The
reign of Henry II. was the time of the crisis, and the hands by
which the happy moment was seized were his own and those of his
ministers. If Henry had been a better man his work would have

110

THE CHRONICLE OF THE REIQUB

Henry'*
rclfrna
critical one

National
character
in relation
to national

institutions

Fusion of
Anglo-Saxon
and Norman
dements

Henry's
reign in
regard to
the amalga-
mation

He extin-
guishes the
remains of
feudalism
in the
government

Three

influences in
opposition
from lOfifl
tollM

been second to that of no character in history; had he been a
weaker one than he was, England might have had to undergo for
six hundred years the fate of France.

Such a speculation may be a mere flight of fancy, but it accords
in its main features with the facts of history, and if there be such a
thing as national character it must be closely connected with national
institutions. In one state of society they grow out of it ; in another
it is fashioned by them until it seems to grow out of them : they
develop together in a free state, in a subject one they affect one
another by assimilation or opposition according to the nature 'and
duration of the pressure.

What is merely a probable speculation at the best, in regard of
character, is, however, a true story applied to institutions. The
Anglo-Saxon and the Norman institutions had been actually in ft
state of fusion since the Conquest, and the reign of Henry gave to
the united systems the character which has developed into the
English constitution. It destroyed the undue preponderance of one '
power in the State over the others ; it secured the firm position of
the central force, and it opened the way for the growth of wealth in
social security ; it prevented England from falling under a military
monarchy, or into a feudal anarchy ; it so balanced the forces
existing in the State as to give to each its opportunity of legitimate
development. Magna Carta could never have been won by lawless
barons for a crushed and spiritless nation, nor would the people
when they learned their strength have satisfied themselves with the
moderate aims that contented the heroes of the thirteenth century,
had they been left too early without restraint, or been kept under
prolonged oppression. The Angevin kings, the Norman nobles, the
English churls, the Roman clergy, become in one century the
English people.

The reign of Henry II. saw the end of feudalism, so far as it had
ever prevailed in England, as a system of government ; the executive
power was taken altogether out of its hands ; the military strength
of it was subordinated to the general aims of government; the
legislative capacities of the system were held in formal existence,
but in practical abeyance, for better times and better administrators.
Feudalism continued to exist legally as the machinery of land
tenure, and morally in its more wholesome results as a principle of
national cohesion and the discipline of loyalty.

During the ninety years that followed the conquest in England,
three distinct interests were either in active conflict or in passive
opposition : that of the royal power, that of the Norman feudatories,
and that of the people.

The fourth interest, that of the clergy, does not in this view

OF HENRY U. AND RICHARD I.
assume the prominence which it exhibited later on. It is doubtless what was

. ., , , i • ji XT i -i -i i the position

true that the privileges of the church in the JN orman era should be of the
considered as the franchises of the people ; l it was through the
clergy only that the voice of the people could be heard. From the
unity of the national church the unity of the kingdom had itself Earlier and
sprung, and the liberties of the church were almost the only liberties importance
that were left under the change of dynasty. Nor can we forget that position of
in the English constitution, that system which it was the Conqueror's tllc clergy
object to retain and administer by his own vassals, far the most
important place was given to the clergy, the prelates being by virtue
of their spiritual character the chief members of the royal council,
and the archbishop of Canterbury occupying a position co-ordinate
with royalty itself. The king was not a king until he was crowned,
and before he was crowned he must bind himself to maintain the
liberties of the church and to act by the counsel of the primate.

For these reasons the Church of England even more than the ^"£h)£_al
churches of the continent was in a position to enforce her claims as reticai

*• standing

' the pillar and ground of the truth,' as the upholder of righteousness points of

tli 6 clcrEry

in a degraded and most licentious court, and as the sole monument during this

and bulwark of liberty in an oppressed people. And this considera- Kit theWat

tion gives to the position of Anselm, and even of Thomas Becket, a A^eim and

dignity and a constitutional importance which the particular points ^m^et.

for which they contended did not involve. But their position as one.' the ,

* ... majority of

yet was morally rather than politically definite. It would be to the clergy
shut our eyes to the plain truth of facts if we were to view the action
of Anselm or Thomas as the action of either church or people. The
bishops and higher clergy were for the most part on the king's side,
appointed to their places as the rewards of services done to him, or
as safe instruments of his policy. The king's court and chapel, full
of ecclesiastics, represented the actual status of the clergy at the
time more truly than Anselm or Thomas, even with the national
spirit of the monasteries at their back. The freedom of the church
only on occasions and emergencies appeared as a real thing. The
counsel of the primate might be given, but it depended on the will
of the king and the influence of his court whether or no it should
be taken. Lanfranc and Theobald could influence even William
Eufus and Henry II. ; Anselm and Thomas, men probably of more
force of character, though not more righteous and earnest, took a
different course and signally failed.

The constitutional action of the church had yet to be revived and The cousti-
developed, and it owed much more to Hubert Walter and Stephen action of
Langton than to the two saints of the twelfth century. The personal LhrenHyrch

1 Palgrave, Normandy and England, iv. 169.

112

THE CHRONICLE OF THE REIGNS

of more
importance
at n later
period

The inter-
ests of
the king anil
people were
now one
against that
of the
barons

The Con-
queror did
not Intend
to reproduce
in Bnglaml
the state of
things that
existed in
Prance

What
amount of
feudalism
was intro-
duced by
William ?

quarrel of William Rufus and Anselm, and the contest on investitures
under Henry I., had not a direct bearing on the national life, and
tended, especially the latter, wliich had its origin in circumstances
external to England, to place matters on a false issue. Throughout
the period the higher clergy ruled with the king, and the lower
suffered with the people. The baronial importance of the bishops,
and the distinct recognition of the interest of the clerical estate,
apart from the king and nobles, date from the later years of Henry I.
and the reign of Stephen. Roger of Salisbury and Henry of Blois
may be regarded as the founders of the secular as S. Anselm was of
the ecclesiastical independence of the clergy. They were in different
ways the precursors of Thomas Socket, who combined singularly
the worst political qualities of the three. But the importance of the
Becket quarrel itself was greater in its indirect consequences than in
its simple political issue, and its interest is rather moral or personal
than constitutional.

Of the three temporal interests, those of the king, the barons,
and the people, the first occupies the chief place in considering the
external history of England, the third in the investigation of the
internal ; but they had this in common, that their real aims were the
same, the consolidation and good government of the country ; whilst
the position of the barons, their selfish aims and foreign aspirations,
were as dangerous to the crown as they were in effect oppressive
to the people.

One benefit which England gained from being conquered by a
French vassal was doubtless this, that she was secured from ever fall-
ing into the condition in which France then was. The Conqueror, as a
statesman, saw that it would never answer his purpose to suffer the
existence in England of the class of vassals to which he himself
belonged. The king of England should never be subject to the sort
of influences which he himself and his fellow feudatories had
exercised over the kings of France. In this stage of history every
limitation of the power of the nobles was an extension of the liberty
of the people. It became very different afterwards, when the power
of the crown was established, and a new nobility sprang up under
different conditions, with the will to be the leaders and to care for
the interests of the nation ; but this belongs to a later period than
the reign of Henry II.

William the Conqueror may be said in a general way, with
sufficient correctness to have introduced feudalism into England ;
that is, he most probably reduced the land tenures to feudal principles
universally, his military establishment in his later years was feudal,
his ministers were chosen from among his great vassals, or were
rewarded with great fiefs, and, so far as he allowed any legislative

OF HENRY II. AND RICHARD I. 113

action independent of or co-ordinate with his own, such legislative
action, being exercised by men whose position was owing to their
feudal rights, was of a feudal character.

But it was no part of his system that the executive power should His ivstric-
be administered by feudal officers. This may be considered as (U-veiop.
proved by the common arguments : first, the fact that by dividing feudai°
the possessions of those nobles whose services he was obliged to fcl
reward on feudal principles, and by requiring the oath of allegiance
to himself to be taken by all freeholders throughout the country, he
endeavoured to avoid raising up a class of vassals such as existed in
France and Germany, where the sovereign was simply primus inter
pares, or more truly the servant of his own servants. The second
argument is based on the amount of subordinate organisation which
he retained from the ancient Anglo-Saxon institutions.

The nobles who accompanied William were not likely to fall in The very

T-i , -i !..,.. i different

with such a plan, i or feudal reciprocity m its proper sense they views of the
might have had little or no favour, but they had existed for several <i) Their
generations under feudal principles, and they were in a manner Sons
acclimatised to the air of France. prideofrace

But the root of the matter lay deeper far than the incrustation
of feudalism. The pride of race was strong within them. It was a
confederation of Norsemen that had placed Eollo and his successors
on the throne of Normandy. It was a confederation of volunteer
vassals, in whom the spirit of the Vikings had revived, that mustered
the fleet and army which won the kingdom of England. William
might be to the English the testamentary heir of the Confessor ; to William's
to the French the mightiest vassal of the crown ; but to his own to his™ '
followers he was the head of the race, the duke of the Normans, ^araetL;
rather than the king of England' or the count of Rouen. If he was
primus, they were pares, most of them of purer descent, many of
them of equal origin : his actual primacy he owed chiefly to his
personal character.

Further, the early troubles of his reign in the duchy had con- and to his
siderably diminished the number of true Norman nobles, and this commons •
had the effect of concentrating the greater fiefs in the hands of his ^Y^ wore
own relations. Both these things contributed to the maintenance of less effective
his personal authority, whilst they left the difficulties of the situation of ins
to his successors, with whom the bonds of influence and relationship
were weaker, and who had to contend with a body of nobles who
were becoming fiercer and prouder as they became fewer.

These men were ready enough to take advantage of such points
of feudalism as favoured their own independence. Why should they
not occupy to the crown which had been won by their exertions
the same position that they saw the counts of Champagne and

114

THE CHRONICLE OF THE RKUJXS

Pride of
race and
conquest in
the barons

(3) Tbelr
pretensions
favoured by
the condi-
tion of the
couq tiered
country

(4) Their
jealousy of
the minis-
ters of the

Vermandois and the dukes of Normandy and Burgundy bearing to
the crown of France, whose wearer was their noar kinsman, and far
less indebted to them for his position ? Nor wore they unworthy to
be the equals of kings, much less of French vassals, who counted
among their inferior members the house of Haute ville, which was
giving law to Italy and threatening the Eastern Empire.

There was much, however, in the condition of the conquered
country which might seem to favour the chums of the nobles to
feudal independence. England under the Confessor had been
broken up into great earldoms or satrapies, each containing many
shires, and in fact representing in some measure one of the ancient
kingdoms of the Heptarchy. Each earl governed by authority
directly delegated by the sovereign, and was supreme in his earldom,
both in war and in peace : but the dignity was not necessarily
hereditary, and although probably given in theory for the life of the
grantee, was subject to the conditions of promotion and degradation.
The exact parallel for this state of things must be sought in the
contemporary condition of Germany and in a much earlier condition
of France. But the main point of separate independent jurisdiction
strongly resembled the feudal division of the latter country. It
would have been the most natural thing in the world for Hugh of
Avranches, Roger Montgomery, or William FitzOsbern to have
taken the place of Tostig, Swegen, and Leofric. The urgency with
which the local franchises of the Anglo-Saxon lords were pressed by
the Norman barons to the exaltation of their own privileges may
serve to show that had the chance been given them they would have
gladly claimed the greater jurisdictions on a like plea. As it was,
they found themselves, in relation to the royal power, in a position
actually less influential than that which had been occupied by the
Anglo-Saxon earls. They had conquered England for William, not
for themselves. William's own measures show that he foresaw the
results of this ; but his sons had the first experience of its working.
In the attempt to set aside the male line of the ducal house in the
rebellion of 1095 may be traced the principle of the equality and
confederation of the race, as well as an attempt to assert for the
great vassals the independence of feudal princes. Robert Mowbray
expiated his rebellion by a life-long captivity, but until the Norman
nobility became extinct he never lacked imitators.

With this deeply-seated feeling of insubordination was closely
connected the jealousy with which the nobles regarded the king's
ministers. Under the Conqueror, whose most faithful adherents
were men of his own blood, acknowledging in him the source of their
fortune and the pre-eminence of strength, we find few complaints of
the aggrandisement of insignificant officers. William's servants were

OF HENRY II. AND RICHARD I. 115

in fact chosen either from the nobles themselves or from the clergy,
whom the close union of secular and ecclesiastical supremacy in the
friendship of the king and Lanfranc kept in their places, and from
whose number the notoriously unworthy were for the most part ex-
cluded. Under William Rufus begin the complaints of unworthy
favourites and ignoble ministers, and at the very same time the
difficulties with the clergy, and the revolutionary attempts of the
great vassals. Both the clergy, so far as Anselm represented them,
and the vassals, aimed at a position to which, on the analogy of
other countries, they felt themselves entitled, although they had
never yet possessed it : the king's only possible agents in opposing
their attempts were the ministers whom he had chosen, and whom
gratitude and community of interest attached to him and his policy.
If these men did not content themselves with hindering the aggran-
disements of the nobles and clergy, but actually tried to drive them
from the vantage-ground which in the exigencies of the Conquest
had been accorded to them, there is nothing surprising in the fact
that they were even more obnoxious to their opponents than was the
king himself.

For to the difficulties which the very existence of the Norman <5> Th? dif

putes about

feudatories, with their notions of race and of French feudalism, thesuc-
brought to the royal power, must be added certain weak points in shaken the
the position of the crown itself. With the life of William I. ceased of tiie nobles
the unity of Norman feeling in England. Almost immediately on t
the accession of William Rufus the question of succession emerged,
and with it division. Eobert of Normandy had his adherents if he
had had the will or energy to use them. Stephen of Aumale was
the favourite of another, and that a very powerful, section of the
barons. On the death of William Rufus the claims of Robert were
asserted, and so far maintained as to compel Henry to enter into an
alliance with the subject race. On Henry's death followed the
divisions between the parties of Stephen of Blois and Matilda, and
later on between the Norman and Angevin parties among Matilda's
adherents. In all these divisions the nobles had ranged themselves
sometimes on one side, sometimes on the other : they had contracted
enmities and reconciled them, formed friendships and broken them :
hardly any house had uniformly acted on the same principle, and
consequently hardly any had not at some time found itself in oppo-
sition to the royal authority.1 Thus the principle of attachment

1 ' Heralds tell us that the shield looked oddly ? the majority of the

of the traitorous knight is to be re- emblazonments turned upside down,

versed. Had this law of chivalry unless a double infidelity authorised

been observed in Normandy, would Sir Knight to turn his shield right up

not the beautiful stained glass glowing again.' Palgrave, Normandy and

in the rich church windows have England, iv. 256.

i 2

116

THE CHRONICLE OF THE REIGNS

But they
had also
dlrided
them among

Henry not
bound to t he
Normans or
their policy

His struggle
with the
harous not
embittereU
by personal
feeling

Xo great
forfeitures

He had at
drat an
ea«y task in
humbling
the barons
and dis-
mantling
the castles

to the king had grown weaker and the love of independence
stronger : the right of private war and of separate alliances had
been exerted if not vindicated, and it was fortunate indeed for the
royal power that it had been wielded by strong hands, or England
must have fallen altogether, as it did in Stephen's reign, into chronic
anarchy. Fortunately also the internal feuds divided and weakened
the nobles themselves and diminished their numbers, so that for
Henry of Anjou there was left a not altogether hopeless prospect of
consolidating a strong government.

Henry came to the destructive part of his work with great
advantages. He was for the most part untrammeled by Norman
traditions and associations. He did not owe his crown to the
swords of Norman warriors, but to the support of the clergy given to
the indisputable and undisputed claim which had been won for him
by Earl Robert of Gloucester, the bastard son of his grandfather,
who for all practical purposes was an Englishman. Henry himself
was an Angevin, and the interests of his Angevin subjects were
never likely to come into dangerous collision with his designs or
prospects as king of England.

The Normans had been indeed the enemies of his father and
his paternal house, and but lukewarm supporters of his mother.
But if there were few ties of personal friendship or of common
natural feeling to be broken before the task of demolishing the
rival interest was begun, there were also few incitements to personal
hatred such as might embitter the contest or endanger the result.
The struggle from the beginning was political rather than personal,
and throughout it was rather the power than the estates or the
persons of his enemies that Henry laboured to secure.1 We read
during his reign of none of the great and startling confiscations
which before the death of Henry I. had fallen on almost every
one of the great families sprung from the companions of the
Conqueror.2

The experience of the anarchy of the last reign had taught the
nation generally to wish for a strong government, and the evils of it
were so patent and indisputable that the policy of the new king,
coinciding as it did for the most part with the provisions of the

1 There is a very important passage
in Ralph de Diccto, 570, too long to
tran.scribe. He states that the parti-
sans of the younger Henry were
chiefly those on whom the hand of
the father had fallen heavily, ' quia
rex pater, regiai titulos dignitatis
ampliare procurans . . . castella
patriae suspecta vel everteret, vel in
Buam redigerct potestatem, bonorum

occupatores quaa suam ad mensam
quasi ad fiscum ab antiquo pertinere
noscuntur, patrimonio proprio con
tentos esse deberc assereret et etiam
cogeret, &c.'

* ' Testantur hoc Normannornm
proceres, alii capti, alii incarcerati.
alii exhteredati in hodiernum diem.'
Job. Salisb. Policr. vi. 18.

OF HENEY II. AND KICHABD I. 117

treaty by which the crown was secured to him, was acquiesced in at
first with very little difficulty. The castles of the smaller tyrants
were speedily dismantled,1 and with them their power of doing
mischief was annihilated. It was only on the marches that resist-
tance was offered, and before the end of the first year of the reign
Hugh de Mortimer was brought to submit 2 and William of Aumale
deprived of his last stronghold. The Scots restored the northern
provinces which had been won in the name of Matilda.3 England
welcomed peace and prepared to accept the reforms which alone
could strengthen her internal union and enable her to defend and
extend her borders. The king was at liberty to carry on alternately He was thus
his measures of domestic legislation and his plans of foreign policy. legislate*0
His presence was for several years scarcely required in England,
where he had shown both the strength of his hand and the real
moderation of his aims.

But the shock which followed the quarrel and death of Thomas The rebei-
Becket gave the signal for the resuscitation of the slumbering and 1174
elements of discord, and the rebellion of Henry and Eichard in
1178 afforded occasion for the outbreak which nothing but the
personal abilities of the king and his ministers prevented from
becoming a revolution.

It was still, if we may judge of it by the ordinary rules of; union of
evidence, far more a political than a personal conflict. Nearly all gobies**
the great earls both in Normandy and in England were engaged on £f^n.stinhe
the side of the princes. Those of Chester, Leicester, Norfolk,, England.
Huntingdon, and Ferrers ; the king of Scotland, the great baron of
Mowbray, Hamo de Masci, Richard de Morville, and Geoffrey of the
Cotentin, representing the remnant of the party of the Conquest :
men and families who had never before found themselves on the
same side, united against the king.

In Normandy the great feudatories of the duchy, many of whom and in
had large estates in England, were bound up both in cause and in

1 ' Mox castella nova quse in diebus belonging to the bishop of Winchester,
avi sui nequaquam exstiterant com- On his return to England in 1157, he
planari prseeepit, prseter pauca in took into his hands the castles of
locis opportunis sita quse vel ipse Hugh Bigot, and the holdings which
retinere, vel a pacificis ad regni had been conferred on William the
munimen retineri voluit.' W. Newb. son of Stephen at Pevensey and in
ii. 1. Norfolk by the treaty of Westminster.

2 Eoger of Gloucester gave in about Brompton, 1038 ; B. de Monte, ad
May; Hugh de Mortimer on the 7th 1157.

of July. E. de Monte, ad 1155; Ger- 3 In 1157. B. de Monte, ad ann.

vase, 1378. Henry destroyed Cleobury " Aquilonales Anglisa regiones . . .

Castle, the property of Mortimer, and nomine Matildis dictsa imperatricis et

on Roger's death retained the earldom hseredis ejus olim a David Scottorum

of Hereford in his own hands. In rege adquisitas." W. Newburgh, ii. 4.
the winter he seized the castles

118

THE CHRONICLE OF THE REIGNS

Unfaithful

V!l.--;li- II:

Normandy

The king
had ft party
of hi- own
relations
and a few
nobles,

bat its
strength
lay in the
ministers
and people

The bishops
were falthi'ul

kindred with the English rebels. The count of Meulan was the
head of the Norman Beaumonts, as the earl of Leicester was of the
English : the counts of Eu and Evreux ' represented junior
branches of the ducal house ; those of Alcn<;nn and Ponthieu the
heirs of Robert of Bellesme. The earl of Chester held the here-
ditary viscounties of Bayeux and Avranches. All these were
marshalled against king Henry. Arnulf, bishop and count of
Lisieux, played in Normandy the same double game that his fellow
count bishop Hugh of Puiset was doing in England. William of
Aumale, who like Hugh of Puiset was closely connected with the
house of Champagne, and had to revenge the loss of his almost
regal power north of the Humber, after a mock defence yielded his
whole continental possessions to the insurgents.9

On Henry's side were the earls of Cornwall, Warren, Gloucester,3
and Arundel, all closely connected with him by birth or marriage,
and the earl of Essex, William de Mandeville, whose tie was that of
simple honour and gratitude. Strongbow earl of Striguil,4 the earls
of Salisbury, Warwick, and Northampton were on the same side ;
but Strongbow's chief interest now was in Ireland, and the others
were, either in possessions or in character, insignificant. The
strength of the royal party consisted first of those who had risen to
importance as the ministers of Henry's reforms, and secondly of the
people, who had benefited by them ; Ranulf Glanvill and Richard
de Lucy at the head of the freemen of the country, supported by the
Stutevilles, the Umfravilles, and others who had become more
thoroughly English than the greater barons.

The whole of the bishops both in Normandy and in England
remained loyal ; only Hugh 5 and Arnulf tried to be on both sides
at once.

The sources of disaffection in Aquitaine and Poictou were of the
same sort as those in Normandy and England, but in these countries
the cause owed, as in Brittany, somewhat of its character to the
influences of nationality and to the personal popularity of the
princes.

' The right of garrisoning the
baronial castles was a chief preroga-
tive of the dukes of Normandy, and a
source of constant soreness with the
great vassals. In 1161 Henry seized
the castles of the count of Meulan and
other Norman barons ; in 1166 those
of the counts of Ponthieu and S£ez;
those of the Lusignans in 1165 ; those
of the Leonois in 1171. In the same
year he doubled the revenues of the
duchy of Normandy by resuming
lands which had been detained since

the death of Henry I. All the nobles
who suffered this treatment are found
in arms against Henry. Cf. B. de
Monte, 1159, 1161, 1164, 1166.

1 R. de Diceto, 571.

1 Yet even the earl of Gloucester
was suspected both now and in 1188,
and his son-in-law, the earl of Clare.
R. de Die. 578.

4 Strongbow was, however, present
with Henry in France. R. de Die.
572.

5 R. de Die. 573.

OF HENKY II. AND KICHABD I. 119

What pretexts were alleged by the barons as the cloak of the The rebels
real causes of discontent does not appear.1 In spite of the strength common
of their numbers and mass, and in spite of the real unity of their °
interest, they had no organisation, they had no bill of grievances, no
head and no watchword. The whole rising bears the character of a
simple reaction against the pressure of strong government ; a re-
action the opportunity of which was so obvious as to strike all alike,
and to call even without concert all the subject forces into motion ;
but the only definite purpose of which was to create a confusion out
of which the strongest hand might pluck advantage. The odds were
apparently dead against the king. The rebels could hardly have
calculated, considering the immense extent of the area of disaffec-
tion, the importance of the leaders, the alliance of the kings of France
and Scotland, and the open adherence of Queen Eleanor and her
sons, on a result which would strengthen the royal power and exalt
beyond precedent the personal importance of Henry.

The whole rebellion was crushed in a few months, and so The rebel-
thoroughly that the good fortune of the king seemed to his con- crushed6 ' y
temporaries more astonishing than even his skill and energy. The
king of Scotland, the earls of Chester and Leicester were prisoners,
the earls Ferrers and Bigot and Mowbray vying with one another, Heury's
in haste to surrender, Henry found himself in firmer possession of strength-
the strongholds of the country than he had been even in 1156.2

It is difficult to say to what the barons owed their immunity He abstains
from punishment, if it were not the certainty that it was safer to purashmeut;
humble than to destroy them ; safest of all, while disarming the
system that upheld them 3 to win them by moderation, kindness,
and confidence.4

In the year 1176 the king took into his own hands all the castles
of England and Normandy ; 5 he did not even except the castle of

1 Sir Francis Palgrave says of the ex eo quo infirmari debuit, confir-

rising of the Norman barons against maretur in regno.' Dialogus de

Robert in 1087, ' Coukl the barons Scacc. p. 38.

have patronised a chronicler of their 3 He immediately destroyed the

own, this continued turbulence might castles of the rebels. R. de Die. 585.
have been described as a patriotic 4 Gir. Camb. De Inst. Pr. ii. 3.

struggle to regain their lawful inde- ' Inter ipsos triumphales eventus

pendence. Under William, however, summam clementiam . . . conser-

they had really sustained no grievance vavit.' William of Newburgh has a

except the necessity of submitting to chapter on this, full as usual of good

the law.' Normandy and England, sense, ii. 38, ' Comprehensis insuper

iv. 25. The same may be said almost hostibus tarn enormis sseculi incen-

exactly of this rebellion. Compare toribus inaudita pepercit misericordia,

also the condition of Normandy under ut eorum pauci rerum suarum, nulli

Robert (ib. 231) with that of England vero status sui vcl corporum dispendia

under Stephen. sustinerent.' Dialogus, p. 38.

- ' Sic in brevi pene rebelles omnes 5 R. de Diceto, 594. Cf. 600.

obtinuit, ut longe fortius quam prius

120

THE CHRONICLE OF THE REIGNS

but t«k.~

the m.<t N~
of tl.r

country

for retain-
ing hla
bold on
the castles

Sketch of
Henry's
civil re-

'i.rms

Hi* advan-
tages in
inheriting
the old
policy with
a new
potdtiou
that enable- 1
him to
develop It
in his own
way

Ongar, which belonged to the faithful Richard de Lucy. Those of
the earls of Chester, Leicester, and Norfolk, with those of Roger
Mowbray, he dismantled. But early in the following year he
restored the offending earls to their estates, the castles excepted, of
which two only belonging to the earl of Leicester and one of the earl
of Chester's remained standing.

That the policy of disarmament might not be evaded, the pre-
cautions of law were superadded. The justices in itinere were
instructed in 1176 to take cognisance of the warderships of all the
castles that were suffered to stand, and to enforce the complete
demolition of the condemned ones. At the Council of Geddington
in 1177, the custodians of all the Northern castles were removed,
and from this time the maintenance of the royal grasp on these
strongholds was regarded as a distinct object of policy. Gradually
all the offenders were restored to their territories, but the custody of
the castles was withheld. The visitation of the castellanships was
made a regular article of the commission of the judges, and the
governors were frequently changed, so as to vest the posts gradually
and entirely in the hands of the king's officers. The result was that
England enjoyed internal peace for the remainder of the reign, and
when in 1188 the rebellion of the princes threatened abroad to
renew the terrible scenes of 1174, the simple measure of securing
the persons of the suspected earls was sufficient, and was regarded
as more than sufficient, to guarantee the tranquillity of the kingdom.

Less stirring in incident but far more important in their effects
on the life of the nation were the measures by which Henry built up
the civil portions of his design of consolidation. They do not occupy
the same space in the pages of the historians, and have yet to be
investigated with the whole apparatus of archaeological research : for
they lie for the most part within the unpopular region of legal
antiquities. But the most superficial view of the politics of the age
would be not merely imperfect, but glaringly false, without some
attempt to describe them.

In this respect as well as in the former Henry came to the crown
with great advantages : he succeeded to the policy of the Conqueror
and Henry I., and inherited the wisest and most faithful servants of
the latter. It was in his favour also that, following on a period of
anarchy, his reforms were not restricted to a simple restitution of the
past, but with the restoration of government he might almost at will
develop and extend its expedients. His general policy seems to have
been a thorough development, in the direction of national life and
unity, of the principles which had appeared in germ in the selfish
policy of his predecessors.

It is, I think, strictly true to say that the actual alteration of the

OF HENRY II. AND RICHARD I. • 121

institutions of the country which took place at the Conquest has been overstate-
generally as much overstated on the one side as underrated on ^the effects of
otner. One school of historical writers sees in the Norman policy quest^xwo
very little more than a crystallisation of a process which was going view\ of ^
on rapidly in the same direction during the last century of Anglo-
Saxon rule ; the other regards it as a complete subversion of both
persons and institutions. I believe the truth to be that the plan of . A third
the Conqueror was simply to dovetail a feudal superstructure into
the fundamental framework of the Anglo-Saxon polity.

That there was nothing radically inconsistent in the two systems The feudal
is historically clear ; both sprang from the same home in the systems
Teutonic forests. The allodial or Saxon system was that of the
Germans at home ; the feudal or Frank system was their policy as
settlers and conquerors.1 William came with a band of feudal nobles
to a free people ; his nobles might continue to be feudal and his
people might continue to be free.

In the Anglo-Saxon system the strength of the fabric was, as I Comparison
have said before, in the lower ranges of the organism. The cohesion °
was weakest as the pyramid should have risen to an apex. In the
feudal system the cohesion was the strongest above ; the principle
of unity was fidelity to the superior, not the maintenance of the
distinct freedom of the individual by voluntary association. At the
foundation of the former was liberty, at that of the latter serfdom.
The common medium was land, the possession of which was in the
allodial system the proof "of freedom, in the feudal the occasion of
service. The feudal system was the exponent of the views of the
rulers, the allodial of those of the nation.

To Wifliam the Conqueror, as indeed probably to the later Anglo- wuiiam the
Saxon kings, the feudal system was doubtless the model system treatment of
of government : to William it was the only one experimentally
known. But it did not follow that it was to be forced in all its details
on an unwilling people. He intended to be king of England, the king
of the nation as well as the conqueror of the crown ; and whatever were
the designs of William Ruf us and Henry L, Henry II. followed in the
steps of his greater ancestor. Why could not a system be devised which
should unite the strength and unity of the higher institutions of feudal-
ism with the strength and unity of the lower institutions of the ancient
system ? True the principle of allodial tenure was to be extinguished :

1 I do not mean by this remark to details and applications grew up after

ignore the mixture of Roman usages the conquerors had come within the

in the feudal customs. The bene- influence of the civil law. Cf. Pal-

fidary principle, from which most of grave, Commonwealth, i. 77, 495, <fec.,

the peculiarities of feudalism rise, who goes even further in ascribing it

owed its origin to the German system to the Roman law.
of the ' gesiths ' of the princes, but its

122

THE CHRONICLE ON THE REIGNS

How to
manage the
bn rouge

William
creates
a new
nobility

He creates
a new ad-
ministrative
system

Partial
success of
bis plan '.

Complete

ma — .,:
Henry IL's

The Con-
qneror
retained
many of
the Anglo-
Saxon insti-
tutions

this had been done in a great measure before the Conquest, but the
institutions of the system might be retained. The feudal tenure
was to be universally enforced, but feudal jurisprudence was not in-
separable from it. In Normandy itself the lower organisation of the
feudal theory had never been carried into details or actually displaced
the original institutions of the subject population.1

Was it possible to raise up a great feudal nobility that would be
all-powerful in dependence on and in defence of the crown, but
unwieldy and unmanageable if an attempt should be be made to use
it against the sovereign ? Would it be possible to maintain the
characteristic institutions of the English nation in integrity for all
purposes of peace, justice, and security?

By the forfeitures of the great Saxon earldoms in 1066 and 1070,
William was enabled at once to secure the former object. By the
distribution of their estates and dignities he created a new nobility
on the ruins of the old, which would be collectively strong, but
would have as its sole principle of union the maintenance of that
central power from which it had received its existence. The same
event, by removing the cumbersome superstructure of the Anglo-
Saxon system, enabled him to substitute for the ealdorman and
sheriff ministers subject immediately to himself, and so to retain in
his own hands the administration of justice and the sinews of war,
the national revenue and the national militia. But could such a
constitution be lasting ? The Norman kings tried the experiment
and with partial success. They succeded in creating a feudal
nobility, but not so far as to give the institution that unity and
national spirit in which only it could become consolidated with the
mass of the state. It was not until the Norman nobility was
thoroughly humbled and disabled that internal peace was secured
under the strong hand of Henry II. The same strong hand and
active versatile mind must be traced in the administrative changes
which at last brought the whole system of the country, judicial,
military, and fiscal, under the control of the central government.

William the Conqueror retained in great measure both the laws
and the judicial system of the earlier kings. He rather enforced
than relaxed the observance of the frankpledge, s and the authority
oF the hundred and shire mote : trial by compurgation, the ordeal '
and the wergild. Merchenalage, Danelage, and Westseaxnalage still
continued in their diversity ; the few Norman legal customs which he
introduced were for the Normans only. But the sheriff ceased to be
even in theory the elected president of the shiremote, and became

Cf. Palgrave, Commonwealth, i.
7 Cf. Palgrave, Commonwealth, i.

549

201, and Normandy and England, Hi.
600, Ac.

OF HENRY II. AND RICHAKD I.

123

the vicecount, as his superior the ealdorman had passed through the
intermediate stage of earlship into the Norman count. The change
in this point was indeed rather in name than in reality, for the
sheriff had as well as the ealdorman become a royal officer long
before the Conquest.1 But the theory still was that he was an elec-
tive one, and some form of acceptance in the folkmote may have
preserved the tradition of a time when it actually was so. But
although the name of vicecomes now become s the equivalent of scyr-
gerefa, 2 it signifies no real dependence on or derivation of authority
from the earl. He was the king's representative, judicial, fiscal, and
military, in the shire. The earl has his third penny, but the
authority rests with the sheriff : the earl may be sheriff himself, but
he administers the shire as sheriff, not as earl. So the magistrate
of the hundred becomes a bailiff ; the court of the hundred with its
pleas and profits is granted away to the feudal castellan ; 3 the view
of frankpledge is severed from the sheriff's tourn and leet and
made one of the rights of the feudal manor.

The retention of this lower machinery involved the retention of
the ancient process of jurisdiction. In this, at least in its subor-
dinate arrangements, the Conquest produced little change except in
the substitution of Norman for English names and persons. But
the position of the Norman baron in the office of sheriff differed
from that of the Anglo-Saxon thane. The latter had his sak and
sok, tol and them, outfangtheof, and infangtheof, and to these the
Norman gladly put in the claim of succession : but the Norman had,
besides, his barony in Normandy, which he governed by strict
Norman law, to the process of which, as giving more power to him-
self, he naturally inclined to assimilate that of the English courts
in which he held either a personal or a ministerial presidency. The
office of sheriff was in many cases hereditary, and in almost all was
vested in some important feudal noble.

There were thus co-existing in the country three distinct systems
of lower jurisdiction, exclusive of the ecclesiastical courts. I. The
ancient courts of the hundred and the shire, popular in origin and
process and coeval probably with Anglo-Saxon civilisation ; presided
over by magistrates whose election was claimed by the suitors, and
which, although the claim was obsolete, were distinguished by the
fact, and perhaps in some legal particulars, from those tribunals in
which the king was recognised as the sole fountain of justice. II.
There were secondly the jurisdictions of the ancient franchises, exer-
cised by the lords who had succeeded to the estates whose ancient

The spirit

. The sheriff

change of

Lower

their process

r'

introduction

Three

co-ordinate

]!

1 Palgrave, Commonwealth,!. 128.

2 On the relation between the earl
and the sheriff, and the derivation of

the word 'vicecomes, 'see Madox's note
on the Dialogus, p. 31.

3 Dialogus de Scaccario, p. 42.

124

THE CHRONICLE ON THE REIOK8

Difficulty of
obtaining
and en-
forcing
justice

The means
of obtaining
equal and
uniform
justice

Henry II.

ns 11 legis-
lator

His judicial

rvlnnn -

I. Itinerant
justices

owners had possessed sak and sok. III. Thirdly there were the
strictly feudal courts of the manors, organised by the new nobility
of the Conquest.

The joint existence of these systems was a cause of perplexity to
justice, for not only were their proper provinces and matters of liti-
gation as yet far from being accurately divided, but their very
existence afforded a basis for aggression, and a court which was
intended as a resource in times of peace for civil disputes might
easily, and did in the reign of Stephen, come in troublous times to be
used for the purpose? of oppression and exaction. That the persons
who exercised these several jurisdictions were in many cases the
same, added an element of uncertainty to the attainment of justice
and a temptation to indiscriminate tyranny.

The natural and proper method of diminishing the evil was to
retain in the popular courts as much as possible of the popular pro-
cess, to limit tho exercise of the old franchises,1 and to hinder the
extension of the new ones, regulating the whole by the appointment
of superior judges and avoiding the nomination of those persons as
sheriffs whose feudal position was such as to make it likely that they
would import into their ministerial jurisdictions the principles they
exercised in their feudal demesnes, to the detriment of justice and the
furtherance of selfish aims.2

To Henry II. we owe the framework of a uniform and equal
judicial system, and a general and authoritative enunciation of the
principles of the common law.

There is no occasion to look for a precedent for the institution
of itinerant justices in the missi dominici of Charles the Great, or
in the measures of Lewis the Fat. The theory of a travelling

1 On the limitations of the fran-
chises, see Palgrave, Commonwealth,
j. 211, &c.

* This preference of novi homines
for offices of trust, and discarding of
the great feudatories who had shown
themselves unworthy of it, is a point
on which Ralph Niger exaggerates
greatly : ' Servos, spurios, caligatos,
cubili, mensae, regno prsefecit, et ex
iis quaestores, praetores, proconsules,
tribunes, municipes, forestarios super
provincias constftuit.' By the word
spurios Geoffrey is possibly referred
to: the rest is false. The families
from which Lucy, Olanville, and the
other faithful ministers of Henry
sprang, were equal in all but wealth
to those of the great earls. Yet even
Ordericus Vitalis speaks of the Bas-
sets as upstarts, although the noblest

of the Normans could hardly boast of
a pedigree a century old. There was a
great pride of race among them, but
in their relations with one another
wealth and power were the only real
differences. Ralph continues, ' II-
lustresignominiis oneratos, sedcieteris
rebus vacuos, patrimoniis omniop
privavit, vel subdole portionibus detrac-
tis decrustando sensira adnihilavit'
A punishment in most cases richly
deserved, but by no means really in-
flicted. ' Ex cubioulariia et aulne nu-
gatoribus episcopos, abbates, factos
uuctoritate propria adofficium appari-
torum revocavit, et quern pneaulem
crearat ex preside, in praesidatum re-
creavit ex praesule.' A statement,
with the exception of his son Geoffrey,
altogether false. R. Niger, ed. Anslru-
ther, p. 167.

OF HENRY H. AND RICHAKD I. 125

tribunal had been familiarised to the English by the judicial eyres

of the Anglo-Saxon kings and by the three annual placita of the novelty

Conqueror. Nor was it merely the highest remedial jurisdiction in

the person or court of the sovereign that had thus brought justice

within reach of each region of the kingdom. Special commissions

had been frequently issued for particular purposes.1 The barons of

the exchequer were also the judges of the king's court, and it might Fiscal eyres

seem a simple step to add to the assessment of tallages, which was

the object of their fiscal journeys, a portion of the judicial work

which would otherwise come before them in the supreme court.

Much obscurity hangs over the subject. It is certain that there Early judi-

were judicial eyres 2 early in the twelfth century, but the functions

and exact status of the judges cannot be denned. We can only

guess that they were the officers of the king's court, and that their

functions were limited as much by the demand for their services

as by the terms of their commission. Most suits must have been The county

decided in the county courts before the sheriffs ; in some cases there

seem to be traces of the establishment of provincial judges superior

to the sheriffs : 3 but further litigation must have been expensive,

laborious, and dilatory. We do not even know at what period the Henry i.

more important pleas of the crown were withdrawn from the juris- ^t^esfa

diction of the sheriff, but as it was not later than the reign of ltlnere

Heflry I. we may safely ascribe to him the mission of occasional

judges who were superior to the sheriffs, and whose jurisdiction was

to review both the judicial and fiscal proceedings of the shire. The Henry n.

thorough organisation of the details of this institution was one of

the great works of his grandson.

1 The famous assize of Huncote in at a latter ^period. William Fitz-
1124 must have been more than this : Stephen mentions the justitiarii iti-
'Thes ilces geares sefter S. Andreas nerantes as being at Dunstable before
messe toforen Christes messe held 1163. S. T. C. i. 214. Simon Fitz-
Raulf Basset and thes kinges thseines Peter, who was the judge on that
gewitene mot on Lethecsestre scire at occasion, was the sheriff of Bedford-
Hunde-hoge and ahengen thser swa shire. Roger Pontign., S. T. C. i. 114.
fela thefas swa nsefre 8er ne waeron.' Cf. Grim, S. T. C. i. 23. Cf. R. de
Chr. Sax. ad ann. 1124. Die. 536. Const. Clar.

2 The language of John of Salis- , 3 On this point the opinions of
bury, Policrat. v. 15, is obscure. legal antiquaries give a uniform nega-
1 Quaa vero de prsesidibus aliisque tive, but it is difficult to see what was
judicibus dicta sunt, debent et apud the position of William Espec, and
proconsules, quos nostrates vulgariter Eustace FitzJohn (who were not
dicunt justitlas esse errantes, obtinere.' itinerant judges but great resident
It may refer either to the sheriffs or barons and castellans), in Yorkshire,
to the fiscal journeys of the officers of in the Pipe Roll of 31 Hen. I., if it
the exchequer, as he goes on to charge were not of this sort : nor the meaning
them with extortion, This book was of the charter of the Empress Matilda,
written between 1159 and 1162, too by which she makes Geoffrey de Man-
early, therefore, to refer to any of deville not only sheriff but chief jus-
Henry's reformed institutions, unless tice in Essex. Dugd. Baronage, i.
we suppose it to have been re-written 202.

126

THE CHRONICLE ON THE REIGNS

Acxise of
C'laretidon

in II. -i

Proof of
the date

The year 1166 must be fixed upon as the date, and the Assize of
Clarendon as the act, which mark the first distinct appearance of this
important reform.1 The text of the assize was published first by
Sir Francis Palgrave in the second volume of his history of the
English Commonwealth,2 from the royal manuscript of Hoveden,
and is reprinted in a revised form in the appendix to this preface in
the Rolls Series. I must be allowed to state my reasons for assigning
it to the year 1166.

I. In the year 1176 Henry at a council at Northampton caused
to be recorded and amended an assize called the Assize of Clarendon ;
and this revised edition as given in the present chronicle agrees in
so many particulars with the document in question that there can
be no doubt that it was the one referred to.

II. In the year 11703 Henry made a visitation, by means of
itinerant barons, of all the counties in England for the purpose of
inquiry into the conduct of the sheriffs ; one of the articles of their
commission was to examine into the disposition of the goods of
felons and fugitives under the Assize of Clarendon. This assize was
then of earlier date than 1170.

III. The assize itself contains in its last chapter a prohibition
against the reception or protection of the heretics condemned in the
Council of Oxford. This council was held in the king's presence in
the January or February of 1166.4

IV. But at the beginning of Lent 1166 (March 8),s Henry left

1 Various traces of earlier legisla-
tive acts in the same direction may
be found in the loose language of the
historians, especially William of New-
burgh ; and, as I shall show below,
Henry seems to have restored the
eyres of the judges, as practised in his
grandfather's time, as soon as he
began to reign. The following notice,
as early as 1160, refers only to his
continental dominions, but something
of the same kind may have been done
in England. ' Anno 1160, rex Anglo-
rum Henricus ad Natale Domini fuit
apud Falesiam, et leges instituit ut
nullus decanus aliquam personam ac-
cusaret sine testimonio vicinorum cir-
cum manentium qui bonee vitas fama
laudabiles haberentur. De causis simi-
liter quorum libet ventilandis instituit
ut cum judices singularum provincia-
rum singulis mensibus ad minus simul
convenirent, sine testimonio vicinorum
nihil judicarent, injuriam nemini
facerent, prasjudicium non irrogarent,
pacem tenerent, latrones cunotos

statim punirent, qunque quiete
tenerent ecclesite sua jura possiderent."
R. de Monte, Bouquet, xiii. 304. This
looks very like an instruction to the
county court.

* ii. clxviii. clxxi.

* Gervase, 1410. S. T. C. ii. 262.

4 R. de Diceto, 539. ' Quidam pravi
dogmatis disseminatores tracti sunt in
judicium apud Oxeneford, prmsente
rege praesentibus et episcopis. Quos
a fide nostni devios et in examine
superatos facies cauteriata notabiles
cunctis exposuit expulsos a regno.
Rex Angliee transfretavit circa initium
Quadragesima;.' If this council be
the same as that described by William
of Newburgh, as held about 1160 or
1161 (and they appear to be the same)
the fact that the king was present at
it proves that he or his editor has
given a wrong date. Henry was not
in England from 1158 to 1163.

» R. de Die., 539. Rot. Pip. A'. 12.
Hamtona. See Madox's note on the
Dialogus, p. 19.

OF HENRY II. AND RICHARD I. 127

England, and did not return until 1170, when he immediately issued
the commission for the Inquest of Sheriffs.

The assembly at which this assize was enacted must be referred,
therefore, to a date between New Year's day and the first day of Lent,
1166.

A Council of Clarendon is mentioned by Edward Grim and by Historical
Roger of Pontigny, in which an oath was exacted from the bishops the council
that they would not appeal to the pope. This is very probably the
identical council at which the assize was passed, and may be fixed to
the year 1166 by Grim's statement, that 'per idem quoque tempus '
the pope wrote to Roger of York a letter, dated at Anagni, April 5,
1166.1

For further confirmation of the date, we have recourse to the Evidence
Pipe Rolls 2 as the only existing records for any indications of the ROUSES 't^
royal movements at the time, and we are not disappointed, for the ciareudouat
payments for the conveyance of the king's wine, venison, and harness
show that he did in the twelfth year of his reign (therefore between
Michaelmas 1165, from which date the roll of the twelfth year
began to be made up, and the beginning of Lent) move from London
to Oxford, from Oxford to Woodstock, from Woodstock to Clarendon,
and from Clarendon or Woodstock to Shoreham, whence it would
seem certain that he embarked. The mention of the conveyance to
Clarendon of the king's provers, and of the payment for wax and for
the delivery of summonses, point unmistakably to the holding of a
court of justice at the same place. The mention of the Oxford
heretics in the assize, which gives them an importance far from
proportionate to the real danger arising from their exertions, is a
proof that it must have been drawn up under the immediate pressure
of the excitement caused by the council, and before the real insigni-
ficance of the heresy had been proved by results.

That the Assize of Clarendon3 really marks an "important judicial

1 S. T. C. i. 55, 156. Jaffe\ 708. HANTS. ' Et pro vinis regis et ipsis

- Pipe Roll, 12 Hen. II., WILTS. conducendis de Hantona ad Clarendon

' Pro conductu venationis regis de et ad Wudestoch et ad Sarum et ad

Chepeham ad Wudestoch, et pro con- Chepeham, &c. In liberatione Esnecce

ducendo vino regis de Clarendon ad quando rex transfretavit in Quadra-

Wudestoch.' gesima, etc. In passagio regis Scotisc,

' Et pro conducendo crasso pisce de Gaufridi filii regis,' &c.

Lundonia ad Clarendon vi. s. pro Edw. 'Pro conduc. sell, et hernes. regis

Bl. et Rogero Ostiario xiii. s. iv. d., ad de Wudestoch ad Shoreham xiii. s. et

port, summon, et xii. d. pro cera ad sum- iv. d., et pro feno conducendo ad

monit. et pro pannis ad opus Henrici Wudestoch.'

h'lii regis xvi. li. xiii. s. et x. d. ; et pro A reference to the Dialogus de

custamento probatorum et pro con- Scaccario, pp. 10, 11, will show that,

ductu illorum ad Clarendon xlviii. s. ; these particulars belong to the holding

et pro una hugia ad port, hernesium of a court at Clarendon,

regis ad Shorham et pro ipso hernesio 3 The Assize of Clarendon seems to

viii. s. et x. d.' be identical with the ' arctior assisa

128

THE CHRONICLE OF THE REIOHB

Is an Im-
portant cm
in legal

history

Confounded
with the
Constitu-
tions of
Clarendon

The Pipe
Rolls testify
to the
carrying
out of the
a&iize

epoch, and is not merely a unique relic of a system which had been
in silent operation for some time, may appear from the following
considerations. In the first place the instructions have a retro-
spective view, and the point to which they look back is the com-
mencement of the king's reign. They are not, as the famous
Constitutions of Clarendon were, an enunciation of ' consuetudines,'
but both in form and substance a new legislative act, and the first
chapter contains directions for an inquest into all cases of murder
and robbery that had occurred, not since the last Her, but ' postquam
dominus rex fuit rex.' The Inquest of Sheriffs in 1170,1 on the
other hand, directs the barons errant to inquire into the receipts of
those officers since the king went abroad, a point of time coinciding
with our supposed date of the Assize of Clarendon,3 and the
reference of the same inquest, and of the Assize of Northampton in
1176, to this assize, points to the inference that it was a distinctly
recognised measure of reform. The oblivion into which the assize
has fallen among the early historians may easily be accounted for
by the superior importance which the Council of Clarendon of 1164
held in common estimation. We have no real contemporary
historian of the year 1166, and those who wrote a few years later
very naturally may have supposed, as Gervase of Canterbury
certainly did, that the Assize of Clarendon had been enacted in
1164.3

The assize contains the instructions for itinerant justices holding
courts in the several shires. A further reference to the Pipe Rolls
at once confirms the supposed date of the assize, and throws light
on the functionaries to whom the execution was entrusted. We find

quam rex propter sceleratos constituit,'
of the Dialogus, p. 46, according to
which the goods of ' fugitives ' were
confiscated to the king. See ch. 5
and 18 of the Assize, and the Assize
of Sheriffs, c. 6. It is called ' Regia
constitutio quaa eat pro bono pacis.'
Dial. p. 48. It is well to observe that
the chattels of fugitives are accounted
for earlier than 1166 in some instances,
as in Northumberland, Rot. Pip. 10
& 11 Hen. II. ; (and cf. Const. Claren-
don, xiv., which shows that the con-
fiscation of the goods of felons was
already in use), but that the chattels
of those ' qui perierunt in judicio
aquae,' ' fugitivorum et eorum qui
perierunt ad aquam,' begin to be ac-
counted for in the rolls of the 12th of
Henry II. The roll of the 15th men-
tions the Assize of Clarendon by name,
' Idem vicecomes reddit compotum de

entail is fugitivorum et snspensoruni
per assisam de Clarendon.' Madox,
Hist. Exch. p. 236. And the Assize
of Northampton is named in exactly
the same terms in the rolls of the
22nd.

1 Gervase, 1410.

'-' • Et de catallis fugitivorum pro
assisa de Clarendune, et de catallis
eorumqui per assisam illam perierunt,'
<fcc. Gerv. 1411.

* Gervase at least supposed that
the assize renewed at Northampton in
1176 was the Constitutions of Claren-
don. ' A.D. 1176, rex Henricus
convocatis regni primoribus apud
Northamptoniam renovavit assisam
de Clarendonia eamque praecepit ob-
scrvuri pro cujus exsecrandis institutis
beatus Thomas martyr Cantuariensis
usque in septennium exulavit.' c. 1433.

OF HENRY II. AND RICHARD I.

129

that it is from the year 1166 that the regular series of ' Nova Placita
et NOVSB Conventiones ' before the justices in the several counties
begins. The earlier rolls contain every year ' nova placita et nov®
conventiones,' l but these were apparently transacted before the
sheriffs, and contain fiscal rather than judicial accounts. They also
contain the mention of occasional placita before the justiciar or the
justice of the forest. The roll of the 31st Henry I. contains evidence
of a nearly complete visitation of the kingdom by Geoffrey Clinton in
association with other judges. In twenty-two counties out of the
twenty-six whose accounts are recorded, he appears as judge, the per-
sons associated with him being generally men of local as well as official
importance. A few notices of a similar kind are found in the earlier
rolls of Henry II.2 In 1156 the constable Henry of Essex made a
visitation of most of the southern counties, the chancellor holding
pleas with him in Essex and Kent and the great justiciar in Lincoln-
shire.3 Between the fifth and ninth years of the reign, William
FitzJohn made a similar circuit, probably on forest business, and
in the eighth year Richard de Lucy, the justiciar, held pleas in
Cumberland, which seem to have been of much importance,

Earlier
instances of
eyres on
the rolls

Eyres of
the reign
of Heury I.

Earlier
eyres of
the reign of
Henry II.

1 Nova placita are the pleas of the
year to which the roll belongs. It is
therefore only when we find nova
placita held by the itinerating justices
that we can infer that an iter was
held in that year. Madox, of course,
knew this, but in his lists of the
itinerant justices he has neglected in
the text to mark which judges be-
longed to previous iters, and which to
the year in question. I have tried to
make these matters clearer in the
lists which I have given in the notes,
which are taken from the Pipe Rolls
themselves. Of these invaluable
records there are in print those of the
31st of Henry I., 2, 3, and 4 Hen. II.,
1 Rich. I., and 3 John : besides which
the whole series of Northumberland
accounts are published by Mr. Hodg-
son. Mr. Stapleton's wonderful
Introductions to the kindred Norman
rolls are full of interesting informa-
tion : and Madox's work contains a
mine of details in most elaborate
order. Strictly speaking, the ' placita '
were the fines inflicted by the judges ;
the ' conventiones,' the voluntary
payments made by the parties to
obtain a decision. Dialogus, p. 49.

2 William of Newburgh refers to
Henry II.'s judicial reforms as be-

ginning early hi his reign : ' ut legum
vigor in Anglia revivisceret, qui sub
rege Stephano exstinctus sepultusque
videbatur, cura propensiore sategit.'
Hist. ii. 1.

s In 1156 there are references to
placita, which may have been held in
1155 or earlier by Henry of Essex in
Somerset, Dorset, Devon, Hants,
Wilts, and Sussex ; by Gregory, the
bishop of Chichester, and Ralph Picot
in Middlesex, Surrey, Bucks and Beds :
by the archbishop of York in York-
shire,, and by the chancellor as in the
text. In the following year there are
new pleas and conventions, but as no
judges are mentioned they were
probably held by the sheriffs. In the
6th year there are references to old
pleas of the forest held by William
FitzJohn in Devon, Somerset, and
Hereford ; in the 7th, to similar pleas
by the same in Hereford and York-
shire; in the 9th, to new pleas held
by Richard de Lucy in Cumberland,
he being then great justiciar ; and by
Alan de Nevill (of the forest) in
Oxfordshire. In the 10th, there are
no new pleas or conventions recorded .
In the llth, the references are only
to the old pleas of William FitzJohn
and Richard de Lucy.

180

THE CHRONICLE OK THE REIGNS

Regular

1168

Justices
inittnerr,

judicial and
fiscal

probably as being the first legal settlement of the county after its
restoration by* the Scots.

It is from the year 1166 that these placita are annual and
general, the judges being, as in the earlier visitations, the chief
officers of the court. In that year and the following the pleas in all
the counties are held before Richard de Lucy, associated in seventeen
out of eighteen with Geoffrey de Mandeville.1 In 1168 a com-
mission of four barons of the exchequer* was substituted for the jus-
ticiar and his companion. These visited, jointly or separately, the
whole of England, and both assessed the aid for the marriage of the
king's daughter, and heard pleas. The same judges repeated their
visitation in 1169,8 1170,4 and 1171. In the eighteenth year (1172)
it does not appear whether the scutage for Ireland was levied by the
sheriffs or by the justices, nor before whom the pleas were held;
but in the nineteenth year •"' a tallage on the demesne was assessed
by six companies of the barons, and the principle of the circuits
was for the first time introduced. The following year the business
was transacted by the sheriffs in association with a clerk, and under
the writ of the justiciar. It does not appear quite certainly whether
Byres of the these were judicial or merely fiscal iters.6 In the 21st year the
whole kingdom was visited by four of the judges, Ranulf Glanvill
and Hugh de Cressi taking the north and east, William de Lanvallei
and Thomas Basset the south and west7

It would seem that these annual visitations of the justices proved

1 Madox, History of the Excheqtier
(ed. 1711). Geoffrey de Mandeville
died Oct. 21, 1167. FOBS, Judges, i.
274. But as the fiscal year ended at
Michaelmas he may have finished his
eyre ; but the pleas recorded are in
most cases (if not all) the arrears of
1166.

* A". 14 Hen. II. Richard arch-
deacon of Poictiers, Wido dean of
Waltham, Reginald Warenne, and
William Basset held pleas and col-
lected the aid pur fille marler in all
the soujh and midland counties.
Richard de Lucy held pleas in York-
shire, Northumberland, and Cumber-
land ; and in Kent Henry FitzGerold
was joined with the commission.
These are criminal pleas as well as
fiscal.

» A'. 15 Hen. II. The same four
barons, with John Cumin and Oervase
de Cornhill, in Dorset, Somerset,
Devon, and Wilts.

4 The inquest on the sheriffs of
1170 was not held by members of the

Curia Regis, but by a special commis-
sion of laymen and ecclesiastics ;
they are, however, called barones
errantes. Gervase, 1409.

1 A*. 19. 1. In the Eastern coun-
ties, Seffrid the archdeacon, Wimar
the chaplain, Adam de Gernemue,
and Robert Muntoll.

2. In Wessex, Wido the dean,
Hugh de Bocland, Richard Wilton,
Will. Ruff us.

3. In Kent, Bucks, and Beds,
Richard the archdeacon, Reginald
Warenne, and Nicolas the chaplain.

4. In West Mercia (Glouc., Heref.,
Ac.), John Cumin, Walter Map, and
Turstin FitzSimon.

5. East Mercia (Northants, Notts,
Ac.), William Basset, John Malduit,
and John of Dover, clerk.

6. In Surrey and the home dis-
trict, Reg. Warenne and Gervase de
Cornhill.

' The list is different for each
county, and is given in Madox, p. 84.
' See Madox, p. 85.

OF HENRY II. AND RICHARD I. 181

ineffectual to check the oppressions and exactions of the sheriffs, inquests on
The judges were unable in the absence of the king, and in the in mo
disturbed state of public feeling, to put any check on the sheriffs,
supported as they were by local influence and prescriptive authority.
The complaints of the people became so loud that, in a great council
held at London shortly after Easter 1170, the king sent a strong
commission of barons errant, chosen from the clergy and nobles,
and unconnected with the Exchequer or the Curia, to examine into
the conduct of the sheriffs. The instructions for this inquiry, which
have been several times referred to above, are given by Gervase in
his chronicle.1 They involve a strict scrutiny into the accounts and
legal proceedings of the counties since the king's departure from
England, and into the judgments passed under the Assize of
Clarendon. The work was speedily completed : the commissioners
brought in their returns on June 14, 2 in time for the coronation of
the young king. Gervase does not state the result of the inquiry,
but we find from our author that the king removed all the sheriffs
and bailiffs from their offices. The Pipe Rolls furnish us with one sheriffs
or two cases of heavy fines imposed on the sheriffs under this inquest.3 displaced
Henry, however, as we learn, did subsequently restore several of them,
and they revenged themselves on the people by acting more tyran-
nically than ever.4

It is by looking carefully through the lists of the sheriffs who Legal
went out of office and came into it in 1170 that we get the clearest
notion of what was done.5 It must be remembered that almost all
the hereditary sheriffdoms had been abolished before this time ;
probably before the 81st of Henry I., when we find the administra-
tion of large clusters of counties in the hands of a few great officers
of state. Under Henry II., however, the several counties or pairs
of counties had recovered their several sheriffs, and these officers
were in most cases local magnates, and apparently held the position
for life. A very clean sweep was made of these in 1170, and it is

1 Gervase, 1409. Robert de Monte, deposito omnes ad propria redie-

ad 1170, and our author, R. S. ed. runt.'

vol. i. p. 5. Henry seems to have con- * The case given in Madox is that

templated a similar measure in Nor- of William Basset, who made a fine of

mandyinl!62. He collected a parlia- 100 marks, ' pro fine quern fecit cum

ment at Rouen, ' querimoniam faciens rege de jurata facta super eum de

de episcopis et eorum ministris et communi Inquisitione vicecomitum

vicecomitibus suis.' R. de Monte, ad Anglias per Walterum de Insula et

1162. The oaths to be taken by the Eustatium filium Stephani.' Pipe

juries are given in S. T. C. ii. 262. Rolls of 19 and 20 of Hen. II., Madox,

1 Gervase, 1411. Gervase seems p. 96. He must also have been dis-

to think that this inquest was made missed from the sheriffalty.

merely to frighten the nobles and 4 See our Chronicle, R. S. ed.i. p. 5.

sheriffs into taking the oath to the 5 The following list will show this,

young king, ' et sic timore culparum the first column containing the names

K 2

132

THE CHRONICLE OF THE REIGNS

most important to observe that, in the place of these unjust stewards,
Henry substituted members of the Curia Regis and Exchequer, a

of the sheriffs who went oat of office
in the 16th year, the second those

who continued, and the third those
who were put in in the 16th.

Went out Stayed In Came In

Berks . . ; Adam de Catmer . , .

Hugh de Bocland

Oxon . . Adam de Catmer . .

Alard Banastre

Beds and Hugh de Leya .

. ' David the archdeacon

Bucks

and William

and William Fitz-

FitzRichard

Richard

Cambridge

Philip de Da- .

. . Ebrard de Beach and

and Hunts

ventry

Waring de Bassing-

bourn

Cumberland

. Bx>bert FitzTroit .

Derby and

Robert FitzBalph .

. ! William FitzRalph

Notts

Devon and

. Robert I

'itzBer-

Cornwall

nard

Dorset and

Robert de Puck-

. ' Alurcd de Lincoln

Somerset

erell

j

Essex and

Nicolas, clerk, and

. Robert Mantell

Herts

Stephen de

Beauchamp

Hants .

Richard Fitz- .

Hugh de Gundeville

Turstin

Leicester &

William Basset . .

. ' Bertram de Verdun

Warwick

Lincoln

Philip de Kyme . .

. I Walter de Grimsby

London and

R. FitzBerengar j .

John Bienvenutte and

Middlesex

and Will. Fitz

Baldwin clericus

Isabell

Northumber- William de Vesci .

. Roger Stuteville

land

Norfolk and

Ogier dapifer . I .

. B. Glanvill, Wimar

Suffolk

the chaplain, and

Will. Bardulf

Northants . ' Simon FitzPeter .

. Robert FitzSawin

Rutland

Richard Huiuet

Salop .

Geoffrey de Vere . .

Will, clericus

Stafford

. | Hervey Str

atton

Surrey

Gervase d

3 Corn-

hill

Sussex

Roger Hui . . .

Reginald Warren

Wilts .

. Richard de Wilton

Worcester .

William de Beau- | .

. . Hugo Puhier

champ

Lancashire .

W. de Vesci . .

Roger de Herleberga

Gloucester .

. Gilb. Pipard

Hereford

William de Beau- .

. ' Walter clericus

champ

Yorkshire .

Ranulf Glanvill . .

. Robert de Stuteville

Of those who were dismissed.
Simon FitzPeter, Ogier, and Philip of
Daventry had occupied inferior situa-
tions in the Curia Regis; William

Basset had been and afterwards was
a justice, but on this occasion was
deposed and fined. Of the others
(except Glanvill, to whom Robert de

OF HENKY II. AND K1CHARD I. ,

133

measure which had the direct effect of placing the county courts
under the royal influence and securing their administration by judges
acquainted with the law. The itinerant judges who served between
1170 and 1176 were thus members of the same body which supplied
the sheriffs, and all ought to have proceeded smoothly. The disturbed
and disorganised condition of the country consequent on the rebellion
and its suppression will account for the necessity of changes.

The year 1176, the 22nd of Henry II., is marked by a further
step. In the great Council of Northampton, held January 25, ! it was
determined to add very considerably to the staff of the itinerating
courts, and to adopt the principle of subdivision which had been
found so useful in the collection of the tallage in 1173. The kingdom
was accordingly divided into six circuits, to each of which were
assigned three judges.2 Most of these eighteen judges were at the
same time sheriffs and barons of the Exchequer, representatives of
the system which had been enforced in 1170. It is in reference to
them that the title Justitiae Itinerantes 3 first appears in the Pipe
Rolls, although it was earlier given to the judges in eyre under the
Assize of Clarendon. For their direction, a new recension of that
statute was passed, and from this epoch the institution of itinerant
justices is stated in the law books to date.4

Notwithstanding the importance given to the Assize of Northamp-
ton, it is curious that the arrangement remained in force for only
two years. The itinerant justices went their circuits in 1176 and
apparently 1177, unless indeed it may have been that their visitation
fell partly inTEe 22nd and partly in the 23rd year 5 of the reign, and

The county
courts are
brought
into better
order

Assize of
Northamp-
ton in 1176

Regulation
of the cir-
cuits of the
justices

Eyres under
the Assize
of North-
ampton

Stuteville was probably a deputy) no
more is heard. Of the second column,
only FitzTroit and Stratton were not
members of the king's household ; of
the third, sixteen out of the whole
were employed at the Exchequer.
Compare Foss's Judges and Fuller's
Worthies, passim. In the cases of
Worcester, Salop, and Hereford, the
persons in the third column are the
acting substitutes for the sheriffs.

' B. de Diceto, 588.

2 ' Igitur post naufragum regni
statum pace reformata studuit iterum
rex avita tempera renovare, et eligens
discretes viros, secuit regnum in sex
partes, ut eas electi judices quos
errantes vocamus perlustrarent et
jura destituta restituerent. Facientes
ergo sui copiam in singulis comitati-
bus, et iis qui se lassos putabant
justitia plenitudinem exhibentes,
pauperum laboribus et sumptibus

pepercerunt.1 Dialogus de Scaccario,
p. 38. The pecuniary fines of these
eyres were noted in a roll, which was
transcribed into the Great Roll, with
the names of the justices at the
heading, p. 39.

3 The name occurs in the Dialogus
first in reference to the assessing
justices : ' Fiunt interdum per comi-
tatus communes assisse a justitiis
itinerantibus quos deambulatorios
vel perlustrantes judices nominamus,'
pp. 23, 44. They are called also, p.
36, ' Perambulantes judices.'

4 The list of judges who actually
went on circuit in 1176 will be found
in Madox, p. 94, and agrees almost
exactly with that given by our author,
R. S. ed. vol. i. p. 107. It is in the roll
of this year that the judges are first
called 'justitiae itinerantes.'

s The 22nd. fiscal year would end at
Michaelmas 1176. Dial, de Scacc. 37.

134

THE CHRONICLE OF THE REIGNS

In 1178

Reduction of
the number
of judge*

Question as
to the force
of this act

Discarding
of some of
the old

jndge-

Sd appears on the roll for both years. In the 28rd year, the same
judges were employed as barons of the Exchequer in levying an aid,
and for this purpose they travelled in different combinations, and
made only four circuits.1

In 1178, the king made inquiry into>the proceedings of these
judges, and finding, according to our chronicle, ' that the country
and the men of the country were greatly oppressed by the multiplicity
of the justices, for they were eighteen in number ; by the advice of
the wise men of the realm chose five only, two clerks, and three
laymen, all members of his private household. These five he ordered
to hear all the complaints of the kingdom, and to do right, and that
they should not depart from the king's court, but remain there to
hear the complaints of the homines, so that if any question should
come up amongst them, which could not be brought to an end by
them, it should be presented to the royal hearing, and terminated as
it should please the king and the wiser men of the kingdom.' -

It is by no means easy to determine the exact force of this measure.
It seems impossible to doubt that the eighteen were identical with
the judges of the year 1176, and that the intention was to prevent
them from sitting in the Curia Regis. If the measure of 1176 really
added largely to the number of the judges, and was not merely a
rearrangement of their functions, there can be no doubt that the
increased number was burdensome, and that the king intended to
establish a new tribunal of five, to the exclusion of the rest.
Accordingly the measure has been understood with great probability
to imply the erection of a bank or bench in the Curia, to which
the title of Curia Regis subsequently became restricted, and which
is the original of the present Court of King's Bench.

But it seems probable that this act was attended by the de-
position of most of the eighteen from their judicial functions
altogether, or their relegation to subordinate places in the Exchequer,
for the iters were served in 1178 and 1179 2 by eight judges only,

1 A". 23. For assessing the aid.—
1. Ralph FitzStephen, Turstin Fitz-
Si moii, and William Ruffus in all the
Western counties.

2. Robert Mantell and Ralph Brit
in all the Eastern ones.

3. Roger FitzReinfrid and Gervase
de Cornhill in Bucks, Beds, Sussex,
and Kent.

4. William FitzRalph, William
Basset, and Michael Belet in the
North and Midland counties.

A». 24. Justices.— 1. Roger Fitz-
Reinfrid, Ralph FitzStephen, Robert
Mantell, and William FitzStephen in

all the Western counties.

2. William Basset, Robert de Valli-
bus, and Michael Belet in the North-
ern counties.

* R. S. ed. vol. i. p. 207.

1 A". 25. The judges itinerant are
Ralph FitzStephen, William Fitz-
Stephen, Roger FitzReinfrid, and
Robert Mantell, William Basset,
Robert de Vaux, Michael Belet, and
Bertram de Verdun ; the former four
in the Eastern, and the latter in the
Midland counties. Of these eight,
Michael Belet and Robert Mantell
were not in the list for 1176.

OF HENEY II. AND RICHARD I. 185

two of whom were new appointments ; whilst on the redistribution
of circuits, which was made in 1179 and carried out in 1180, Kanulf
Glanvill alone of the eighteen judges of 1176 was reappointed. Many,
however, of the itinerants of 1176 subsequently reappear in the
transactions of the Exchequer.

The year 1179 is memorable on several grounds.1 Soon after Legal
Easter Kichard de Lucy, who had been justiciar since 1167, retired JJnm1"
into his monastery at Lesnes,2 and the king was left with his hands
full of legal business. He almost immediately called a great council
at Windsor, and in it the following important acts were transacted.
The kingdom was rearranged into four new circuits for the eyres of
the justices. The place of Richard de Lucy was not immediately
supplied, but three bishops were chosen as chief justices, one of whom Rearmnge-
presided over each of the three southern circuits, in conjunction circuits
with one of the king's clerks and three other officers. To the
fourth circuit, which included the whole of the north of England,
were appointed six judges, one of whom was Ranulf Glanvill,
who was probably already designated to the justiciarship ; and
these six judges of the northern circuit are stated apparently to be Eyre of nr»
the six judges appointed to hear the complaints of the people in the
Curia Regis, and answer to the five justices of the bench appointed
in 1178, with Glanvill at their head. The business of the eyre was
quickly transacted, and although the Council of Windsor was only
held about Whitsuntide, the account of the kingdom was brought to
the king at Westminster on the 27th of August.

With this act ends the series of measures taken by Henry II.3 to

1 The passage of Ralph de Diceto the bishops of Winchester, Ely, and
on the legal matters of this year Norwich to be archijustitiarios.
deserves most attentive study. It is These ecclesiastics are not to be
too long to be given entire, but I will blamed for following the example of
note the principal facts. 1. It was in the great Roger of Salisbury. 4. ' Ab
order to check the selfishness of the episcopis igitur supradictis et a con-
sheriffs that the king originally insti- judicibus eorundem querelis justitia
tuted the provincial visitations, ' certis mediante decisis, reservatis quibusdam
in locis jurisdictiones aliis fidelibus ad principis audientiam, regi ratio
suis in regno commisit.' 2. By-and- redditur administrationis vi. kal. Sept.
by, ' rursus aliquot; temporum labente apud Westmonasterium.' 5. The
curriculo,' the king tried by what writer understands this as authorising
class of judges justice was most faith- bishops to preside in the county courts,
iully administered. ' Abbates modo, in comitiis. 6. An investigation of
comites modo, capitaneos modo, the ecclesiastical courts took place the
domesticos modo, familiarissimos same year, and the archbishop of
modo, causis audiendis et examinandis Canterbury had to swear that he
preeposuit." Having done this, he would keep his hands free from bribes,
determined to employ ' homines ... R. de Die. 605-007.
qui licet viverent inter homines " He died in July. Gerv. 1456.
superintendentes hominibus, aliquid 3 For the names of the judges of this
habebant, aliquid sentirent, aliquid iter see Benedictus, vol. i. p. 238 (Rolls
auderent plus homine.' 3. In accord- Series.) It will be seen that only five of
ance with this resolution he appointed the names are those of the judges of

186

THE CHRONICLE OF THE REIGXS

Summary
of the pro-
ceeding* of .
Henry H
M to the
eyre* of the
jndgoi

Ranulf

GlanvUl,

justiciar

II. The
origin of
the Curia
Regi*

secure the administration of justice in the counties.1 He had with-
drawn the jurisdiction from the sheriffs and placed it in the hands of
a travelling court. When this failed he had removed the sheriffs
from their posts and substituted for them members of hi.s own
council. He had further instituted an especial tribunal of itinerant
justices, and divided the kingdom into six circuits. He had super-
seded this arrangement by a special enactment, in which the judges
were associated with confidential members of the clerical and curial
bodies. From this time we lose sight of his direct agency in this
respect ; but the four circuits of the king's judges were established,
the importance of the territorial franchises was broken down, the
character of the sheriff completely subordinated to that of the judge.
By the assize of Richard I. these measures were carried further, the
sheriffs were forbidden to act as justiciars in their own counties, and
by Magna Carta they were restrained from holding pleas of the
crown at all. The itinerant justices were restored by the same act,
but within a few years their visitations became septennial, and they
were gradually and finally superseded by the devolution of their
function on justices of assize.

The appointment of Ranulf Glanvill to the office of justiciar in
1180 probably relieved the king from the necessity of that constant
legislation on judicial matters which marks the previous ten years.
It is another important coincidence that this appointment syn-
chronises so nearly with our first clear indication of the existence of
a limited tribunal erected in the Curia Regis, to which very shortly
the name of Curia Regis became appropriated, and with which the
famous book of Glanvill has so important a connexion.

The Curia Regis in its earlier and wider sense was doubtless the
Common Council of the nation, the assembly of feudal tenants of
the king which succeeded to the functions of the Witenagemote, and
which was held three times a year by the Conqueror. But although
this council acted on occasion as a court of justice, its judicial
functions and name were soon shared with that small portion of it
which remained continuously about the king's person. In this re-
stricted sense it consisted of the great officers of the household, the
justiciar, chancellor, treasurer, and barons of the Exchequer, with
such of his clerks as the king might summon, and it probably in-

former years, viz. Ranulf Glanvill, of
ann. 15 ; Gilbert Pipard, of ami. 22
Thomas Basset, of ann. 21 ; John
Comin, of ann. 15 ; Michael Belet, of
ann. 24. Mr. FOBS adds to these Richard
the treasurer, Ralph Brit, and Nicolas
the chaplain ; but these had only acted
as assessors of the tallage in 1177.

See above, p. 134.

1 Henry's personal share in these
reforms is noticed by the historians :
' Quoties auteni judicibos mollius in
digniusve agentibus provincialium
querimoniis pulsabatur, provisions
regiae remedium adhibebat.' W. Newb.
ii. 1.

OF HENKY II. AND EICHABD I.

137

eluded the stewards of the honours and constables of the castles
which were in the king's hands, or in demesne. It was on the
justiciar and the officers of the Exchequer under him who bear the
title of both justices and barons that the principal burden of judicial
proceedings fell, and to them, as we have just seen, the commissions
of provincial jurisdiction were entrusted.

We have seen that in 1178 Henry substituted a tribunal of five
judges for the collective council of the Curia, with the direction,
' Quod illi quinque audirent ornnes clamores regni et rectum f acerent,
et quod a Curia Eegis non recederent ' ; and that this limitation has
been very reasonably regarded as the institution of the Curia Regis
in its third sense, in which it may be denned as a judicial committee
of the king's judicial council, and which is probably the tribunal
described by Glanvill as ' justiciarii sedentes in banco.' '

Previously to 1178 all the members of the Curia Regis seem to
have exercised the judicial function in the Curia and in the Ex-
chequer, as well as on the eyres generally as on the eyres, in com-
mittees of three or four.2 Now it would appear that the central
jurisdiction was entrusted to a single committee of five. As the six
who were appointed in nearly the same words, the following year,
to be justices of the Curia Regis, were apparently different persons
from these five, with the exception of Glanvill, we may infer that
the appointment of this committee was an annual or even a terminal
one, and that the judges of the Curia, in this new form, or, as we
may call them, the justices of the bench, were a temporary selection
from the whole body of judges, who still discharged the offices of
itinerant justices and barons of the Exchequer. That the itinerant
justices did not lose their places in the Exchequer is clear, from the
fact that their names appear in the lists of persons before whom
fines were levied in the Curia Regis at a later period.3

We have unfortunately no account of further changes in the
constitution of the Curia Regis during this reign, nor, when the
existing records of that court begin,4 can we see quite clearly who
were the presiding judges. The origin of the bench of Common

Heiiry
substitutes
a committee
of five

Origin of
the court
of King's
Bench

Question
as to the
persons
employed in
the Ouria
Regis

Obscurity of
the origin of
the Three
Courts

1 Glanvill, ii. 6, viii. 1, and xi. 1.

* See examples from ann. 21 Hen.
II., downwards, in Madox, pp. 64 and
65. The judges of 1176 held placita
curia in quite different combinations
from those on which they went their
circuits ; but the names are the same.
The placita curia, given by Madox,
are held in 1175 by William FitzKalph,
Bertram de Verdun, and Thomas
Basset; in 1176, by William Fitz-
Ealph, Bertram de Verdun, and

William Basset; in 1177, by Walter
FitzEobert, Hugh de Cressi, and
Eobert Mantell ; but it is difficult to
argue from such scanty data, and
much information is not to be found
in the rolls themselves.

3 See the Fines published by Mr.
Hunter for the Eecord Commission in
1835 and 1844.

4 Edited by Sir Francis Palgrave,
in two volumes, 1835.

138

THE CHRONICLE OF THE REIGNS

III. The
king's

council

Composi-
tion of the
king's

council

Number of
councillors
limited by
circum-
stances

riii- justi-
i-iar and the
i-lmncellor

Pleas is also very obscure. The final separation of the three courts
originated in the direction of the 17th chapter of Magna Carta, but
it does not appear that even then a distinct staff of judges was
appointed to each tribunal. Probably until late in the reign of
Henry III. the same persons continued as before to sit in the three
different courts in distinct capacities.

The same passage in our chronicle in which the original institu-
tion of this limited tribunal is traced, affords an indication of a still
higher court of justice to which questions might be referred which
demanded exceptional treatment ; that of the king in council, which
contains the germ both of the equitable tribunals of the country, of
the judicial power of the chancellor, and possibly of that of the Privy
Council. The words are, ' ita ut si aliqua qutestio inter eos veniret
quffi per eos in finem duci non posset, auditui regi prtesentaretur, et
sicut ei et sapientioribus regni placeret terminaretur.'

According to this theory, which was first brought forward by
Mr. Duff us Hardy,1 this private concilium regis was, prior to the
development of parliament, the highest tribunal in the kingdom.
' It was not only composed of the wisdom of the nation, but also the
great officers fot state ; the chancellor, treasurer, justices of either
bench, and barons of the exchequer, were all active members of it.' s
If this description is applicable to the earlier stages of its existence,
it clearly was little more than a reappearance of the Curia Eegis in
another shape. Considering 'the limited number of councillors
whom the king could summon to such a court, we may suppose that
it was really the whole body of the judges and ministers joined in
the examination of points too knotty for the determination of the
bench ; perhaps reviewing the decisions of their own committees.

It is probable that during the reign of Henry, who had a great
aptitude for judicial functions, and was fond of administering justice
in person, the king himself rather than the justiciar would preside
in this court. During the reign of Richard, William Longchamp
united the offices of regent, justiciar, and chancellor ; and from the
time of his death the office of justiciar was political rather than
judicial. John, like his father, occasionally administered justice in
his own person, although the justiciarship possessed much the same
character as it had under his father. But Hubert de Burgh was the
last who possessed the proper status of the ancient justiciar ; with
the division of the three courts emerges at once the increased im-
portance of the chancellor, and the distinct equitable jurisdiction of
the council. The chancellor was inferior to the justiciar as long as
the old constitution of the Curia Eegis remained. When the council

1 Introduction to the Close Bolls,
pp- 95-105, octavo edition.

1 Hardy, from Sir M. Hale, Intro-
duction, <Src., p. 100.

OF HENRY II. AND RICHARD I. 189

succeeded to its place, the justiciar sank into the chief justice of a
single court, and the chancellor became, in the absence of the king,
the natural president of the council.1

The importance of the chancery, previous to the establishment Earlier
of the independent judicature of the chancellor, was indirect, perhaps, Of the
but by no means insignificant. In its (^rigin, it was the secretarial 2 chancery
department of the Curia Regis, and of that court the chancellor was
a very important member ; he kept the seal and originally drew up
the writs. How great influence he might exercise on the mind of Accidental
the king, so long as the latter took a personal share in the judicature, of the
we may easily imagine ; nor was this all : the chancellor might
introduce modifications into the very terms of the decisions of the
court. The theory that the importance of the chancellor owed some-
thing to the personal influence of Thomas Becket with Henry II. Thomas

. Becket as

has, at different times, had able supporters ; and a passage of John chancellor
of Salisbury, in which the chancellor is said to have cancelled unjust
decisions,3 has been adduced in proof of his exercising a rudimentary
equitable jurisdiction at this early time. The play on the word is not,
however, peculiar to this case, and, if it means anything, must refer
to the official rather than to the personal influence of the chancellor,
the power of wording and recording the decisions of the sovereign.

Another theory, turning on the same point, maintains that the £>i& the
chancellorship in Becket's person was advanced from the sixth to the ship attain
second rank of precedence after the king ; but of this I can find no oTdignity6
definite proof. The functions of the chancellor were more strictly m Becket ?
connected with the administration of justice than those of any other
officer of the Curia, except the justiciar. The constable or the
marshal or the chamberlain, merely as such, could hardly have taken
precedence of the keeper of the great seal, and the chancellor was the
second official in the kingdom before those offices had become attached
to houses of first-rate baronial rank.

Whether, after this was the case, the chancellor would have
maintained his precedence, unless he had been also a bishop, may, I
think, be doubted. From the very early date at which the title of
second 4 from the king is given to Becket, it seems almost impossible

1 Hardy, Introduction, &c., p. 105. de Scaccario, 8,9. No argument can be

2 Cf. Palgrave, Commonwealth, i. drawn from the signatures of charters,
177-179. in which the name of the chancellor

3 Joh. Salisb. Enth. in Policr. ' Hie occupies the same place under
est qui regni leges cancellat iniquas et Stephen as under Henry II. The
mandata pii principis sequa facit.' names stand generally thus : (1) The

* Becket is called ' secundus post bishops and abbots ; (2) the chan-

regem in quatuor regnis,' by Peter of cellor and chaplains ; (3) the earls

Celles. S. T. C. iv. 169. The chancellor and barons. The justiciar signs

•was next in dignity to the justiciar, merely as a baron, and the chancellor

who was ' primus in regno.' Dialogus in his position as a clergyman.

140

THE CHRONICLE OF THE REIGNS

Ralph dc

WarneriUe,

chancellor

Geoffrey,

William
Longchamp

Origin of
the judicial
power of the
chancellor

to suppose that the precedence was given him for personal reasons ;
and the obscurity into which the office falls after his resignation
seems to indieate that it gained nothing from him. Ralph de
WarneviUe, the next on the list of chancellors, is scarcely known,
except by the mention of his resignation. He lived away from court,
in Normandy, and discharged his high function by means of a vice-
chancellor.1 Geoffrey, the king's son, received the seal as an endow-
ment, the actual work being done as before. The office of chancellor
was purchased by William Longchamp, for somewhat less than
Geoffrey Kufus had paid for it to Henry I.1 It is probably to
William Longchamp, rather than to Becket, that the office was in-
debted for an increase of its practical influence. He was at once justi-
ciar and chancellor, and, as under his tenure the chancery assumed
a new and distinct character, so from this time the precedence
and influence of the function was fully and permanently recognised.
But, however the honorary importance of the chancellor arose, it
seems certain that his actual judicature sprang out of his office as
president of the king's council.3 It belongs to the investigator of
our later legal history to examine how this took place, as well as to
decide the steps by which, from the union of the council with the
House of Lords in the Magnum Concilium, arose that confusion of
powers which ended on the one hand in giving to the council
legislative powers, and, on the other, in giving to the House of
Lords that appellate jurisdiction which belonged more strictly to the
council ; whilst the court of the council itself, after retaining its

1 ' Radulfus de Warnevilla, Rotho-
magensis sacrista, thesaurarius Ebo-
racensis, constitutus est Angliee can-
cellarius ; qui modum vivendi parem
a private dissimilem, quern prius
semper babuerat non immutavit,
malens Waltero de Constanoiis,
canonico Rothomagensi, vices in Curia
Regis committere, quam ciroa latus
principis militantes expensis profu-
sioribus cautioribus mensis, ad sui
gloriam nominis propagandnm per
dies singulos invitare.' R. de Diceto,
567, ad 1173. Walter of Coutances
ought to appear in the list of the
Lords Keepers. He is called Sigil-
larius, Dio. 609.

1 The price of the chancellorship of
the younger king, in 1176, was 1,100
marks. R. de Diceto, 589. Our
author says 11,000, i. 122 ; but it will
be observed that the reading depends
on only the inferior MS. The Julius
MS. has a blank for the number of
thousands, which the writer of the

Vitellius MS. may have filled up
from R. de Diceto. If the reading
be right the sum would be 7,8332.
6s. Sd. ; which seems as much beyond
the mark as 733/. 6s. 8rf. seems
below it. The price of the treasurer-
ship in 1159 was 4002. On the state-
ment of Foliot that Becket bought the
chancellorship, see Robertson's Becket,
p. 322. I think it most likely to be
true ; and that although Henry chose
him for his merits, he made him pay
his price, as Richard did with William
Longchamp under similar circum-
stances, allowing him to have it for
3,0002., although there was another
bid at 4,0002. Geoffrey Rufus bought
it for 7,0002. (Ann. Margam, ad 1122),
of which 3,0062. 18s. 4d. was unpaid
in 81 Hen. I., Pipe Roll. William
Longchamp paid 3,0002. for it in 1189.
R. Devizes, p. 9.

' See Palgrave's Essay on the
Original Authority of tht King's
Council, London, 1834.

OF HENRY II. AND RICHARD I. 141

original character in the court of Star Chamber, has, by various Modem
changes of law and circumstance, reached the present time in the mJnts'of
shape of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council.

The loss of the original text of nearly all the measures by which iv. Legal
Henry II. introduced his changes into the customs of the law, pre- of Henry IL
eludes the possibility of "liny such chronological arrangement of
them as I have attempted in the foregoing sketch of his judicial
innovations. It is on these measures for the most part that his
right depends to the title of the founder of the common law. They
were important and numerous, even if we exclude from the calcula-
tion those changes of custom which, appearing in his reign, and not
being traceable in the remains of earlier legislation, are attributed to
him as their author. To this latter class may belong the exchange Probable
of the ancient rule of inheritance for the feudal practice of primo- quences
geniture,1 the disuse of the English language in charters, the JUton legia"
depression of the lowest class of freemen into a state of villenage,2
and the abolition of the invidious distinction between the English
and the Norman freeman.3 To these I might perhaps add the
extinction of the provincial differences of the Mercian, Danish, and
West Saxon customs, but the principle of money compensations for
injuries,4 on the carrying out of which most of the provincial dis-
tinctions depend, and which became obsolete at the same time,
probably involved most of them in its abolition ; whilst others of
the local usages continued long afterwards.

Henry's recognised acts of legislation are to be deduced from the Existing
text of the various assizes which have come down to us, and from
the fragments of the lost ones which are imbedded in the work of
Glanvill. The former class are of course as closely connected with
his changes in the provincial jurisdictions, as the latter are with his
institution or remodelling of the Curia Regis. Any attempt to Nocompa-
evolve the particulars of the changes from a comparison between Instituted e
Glanvill and the Anglo-Saxon laws is, notwithstanding the ap- cnl
parent authority of Madox and Hallam,5 entirely futile. The two faw
are so far different in subject matter as to be incapable of direct
comparison : Glanvill's work is simply a book of process ; the laws
are for the most part the declarations of pains and penalties.
Glanvill is a handbook for the Curia Regis, a court which he him-
self was chiefly instrumental in creating or developing. The
Anglo-Saxon laws, so far as they are declaratory of process at all,

1 Geoffrey's assize of 1185, institut- regni jure . . . licite vendantur.'
ing the inheritance by primogeniture 3 Dialogus, p. 26 ; see above, p.

in Brittany, is printed in Palgrave's 108, note.

Commonwealth, ii. ccccxxxv., from 4 Palgrave, Commonwealth, i. 48.
Lobineau, ii. pp. 317, 318. 5 Middle Ages, ii. 339, &c.

3 Dialogus, p. 28, ' Ascriptitii de

142

THE CHRONICLE OF THE REIGNS

Institution
of juries

Enforce-
ment of
frankpledge
and the law

of strangers

New insti-
tutions of
Henry IL

are the rules of the courts which existed long before the Curia Regis,
and the machinery of which, so far from being superseded by the
machinery of Glanvill's formulas, existed for centuries afterwards.
Hallam, in the form of a conjecture, has stated what is a self-
evident fact to any one who will compare the two.1

The same spirit in which Henry was determined, whilst retain-
ing the machinery of the ancient courts of law, to substitute his own
sen-ants for the magistrates of the county and the lords of the
franchises, appears in his amalgamation of English and Norman
customs in criminal trials. By the first clause of the Assize of
Clarendon, the justices are directed to make inquiry by twelve lawful
men of the hundred, and by four lawful men of every township, by
oath that they will speak the truth, if in the hundred or in their
township there be any man who is publicly accounted or known to
be guilty of robbery, murder, or theft, or a receiver of robbers,
murderers, or thieves. Thus indicted, the criminal is to go at once
to the ordeal of water, and if he fails, to undergo the legal punish-
ment. In this direction the ancient system of the compurgatory
oath is, except in the boroughs, ipso facto abolished ; 2 but the
presentment by twelve lawful men is retained from the Anglo-Saxon
law.3 Their verdict is that of witnesses according to the Anglo-
Saxon fashion : but the process is an inquest under oath, according
to the custom of the Normans.

The enforcement of the law of frankpledge in the same assize is
coupled with the direction to sheriffs to enter all franchises for the
purpose of view.4 The directions as to strangers are adapted closely
from the old law. The court which is to be held before the itinerant
justices is the court of the county under the presidency of the
sheriff; the point of contact between the Curia Regis and the shiremote.

It is from Glanvill that we learn the institution of the new
process in civil trials ; the enactment of the Great Assize,4 and of
the recognitions of Mortdancester 6 and Novel disseisin ; 7 the system

1 Middle Ages, ii. 341.

* On this very interesting question
see Palgrave, Commonwealth, chap.
vii., and on the whole subject, chap,
viii. p. 259, <frc.

1 Palgrave, Commonwealth, i. 257.
' Assembled according to the Anglo-
Saxon law and sworn according to the
Norman law.'

4 See Palgrave, Commonwealth, i.
118, 257, 297.

* The text of the Great Assize is
lost. It is called by Glanvill, ii. 7,
'Regale quoddam beneficium dementia
principis de consilio procerum populis

indultum.' And the provisions of it
are quoted at ii. 17-19.

' The text of this assize is lost ; it
is referred to in Glanvill as ' consti-
tutio regni qua assisa nominatur.'
Lib. xiii. 1. Glanvill mentions an
' Assisa Regni ' (lib. x. c. 12) forbidding
suits concerning the debts or tene-
ments of laymen to be decided in a
court Christian ' ratione fidei interpo-
sitic.' This Assisa Regni is the Con-
stitutions of Clarendon, c. 15.

7 Lib. viii. 9.. ' per assisam de con-
silio regni inde factam.' Compare,
however, with that chapter the assize

OF HENRY II. AND RICHARD I. 143

of fines ; the distinctive character of courts of record ; l the inclusion
of usury in the matters of presentment ; 8 the process of inquiry into
purprestures.3

Side by side with these national jurisdictions and national juris- forest
prudence was the administration of the forests : a department which
was understood to be peculiarly, immediately and exclusively in the
king's hands,4 and in which Henry acted with more severity and in
a more thoroughly tyrannical spirit than can be traced in any other
of his acts, private or public.5 I have given in the appendix (Rolls
Series ed.) a copy of the Assize of the Forest made at Woodstock, pro- Assize of
bably in 1184, of which the assize given in our Chronicle was an
earlier form.

It would be presumptuous in me to attempt to enter on the fields <'enerai

•*••"• *• tendency

of investigation which are opened by the mention of these technical of legal
names. I have said, I think, sufficient to show the nature, extent,
and purpose of the changes. It cannot be doubted that they con-
tributed immensely and directly to the safety of life and property,
the punishment of criminals, the limitation of dangerous privileges,
the abolition of barbarous customs, the gradual assimilation of
public usages, and the amalgamation of the different nationalities.
These points must be worked out by the legal historian : but it
requires no such investigation to assure us that they all contributed
to the consolidation of the royal authority, the increase of the royal
revenue, the directness of royal administration : nor, considering the
part which both friends and foes ascribe to him, can we doubt the
exercise of the king's personal agency, or refuse to trace his peculiar
genius in these institutions.

of Northampton, c. 3, and of Claren- against whom nothing could have been

don. c. 18, and the laws of William proved at law. Ralph Niger says,

the Conqueror, i. 48. ' Avibus coeli, piscibus fluminum, bes-

1 Cf. Glanvill, vii. 16, with Dialog. tiis terras immunitatem dedit, et sata

de Scacc. p. 47. pauperum loca pascua fecit ' (p. 168),

7 See D. de Scacc. pp. 44, 45. and ' legem quoque de forestis inaudi-

•Glanvill, ix. 11. tarn dedit, qua delicti alieni immunes

3 On these, see Palgrave, Common- perpetuo mulctabuntur quum deces-
wealth, i. 225, &c., 257, &c. sores nulla linea sanguinis contigerit.'

4 ' Sane forestarum ratio pcena quo- The enactment which was most odious
que vel absolutio delinquentium . . . was, however, this : ' Nulli infra raetas
seorsum ab aliis regni judiciis secerni- forest® habitant! in lucis propriis aut
tur et solius regis arbitrio vel cujuslibet virgas colligendi aut sylvestria et invia
familiaris ad hoc specialiter depu- „ in agriculturam agendi potestatem
tati subjicitur. Legibus quidem pro- concessitsine forestariis.' Yetessarts
priis subsistit, quas non communi were being made clearly throughout
regni jure sed voluntaria principum the reign. William of Newburgh (iii.
institutione subnixas dicunt,' etc. 26) says that in his punishments for
Dialogus, p. 29. forest offences Henry was milder than

5 Frequent traces of this may be his grandfather, who made no dis-
found in the present work. Ralph de tinction between the man-slayer and
Diceto seems to say that forest charges the deer-slayer. Cf. Dial, de Scacc.
were trumped up against offenders p. 28.

144

THE CHRONICLE OF THE REIONS

Henry'*

HMO*! nil .1
sure*

Connexion
Ix-tvrecn tli
law and tin
n1 venue

Light
thrown on
the origin of
parliament-
ary Insti-
tution*

Source* of

ancient

revenue

Nnrmnu

\vrtem

combining

the feudal

with the

ancient

taxes

Although we would not, with Ralph Niger,1 assert that the sole
object of Henry's judicial and legal innovations was the accumula-
tion of treasure, the connexion between these and his fiscal measures
was very close. It tould indeed hardly be otherwise, considering
that both Curia Regis and Exchequer owed their organisation to
the creative genius of one statesman, and that they were administered
throughout the century by the same persons.2 The sheriffs were
both presidents of the county court and farmers of the revenue : l
the judges were at once justices of the Curia and barons of the
Exchequer ; their work in eyre was as much to assess the taxes as to
decide the pleas ; the chief justiciar was both the principal judge
and ' the first lord of the treasury.'

It would be a most interesting task to attempt to trace the effects
of this connexion of the two departments in constitutional history.
Sir Francis Palgrave has pointed out the fact that the leading features
of our parliamentary institutions are traceable to the judicial system
of ancient times. The parliament is the highest court of judicature ;
the representative principle is identical with that of the jury : and it
may be added that the taxing power of parliament itself may be
traced in the same way to the assessment by juries, of which vestiges
may be found from the era of Domesday Book downwards, which
existed in certain departments in the reign of Henry II., and was
approved and recognised by law under Richard I.

The revenue of the Anglo-Saxon kings arose principally from
their demesnes, including both those which were kept in hand and
those which were let at ferm at rents payable for the most part in
kind. Besides this ordinary revenue, there were the Danegeld voted
by the Witan for tribute or for the defence against the Danes, and
certain other payments known generally under the name of geld or
tax, which were probably derived from commutations of the trinoda
necessitas, or special sums levied for the support of the shipping.

The Norman sovereigns, proceeding on their general policy of
combination, maintained these taxes, and added to them the feudal
burdens. It is indeed uncertain whether the Conqueror and William
Kufus took the trouble of defining the exact nature of the calls which
they made on their subjects for money. With the reign of Henry I.
our actual knowledge of the question begins, and before the end of

1 • Nullo quaestu satiatns, abolitis
antiquis legibus, singulis annia novas
leges, quas assisas vocavit, edidit.'
p. 168.

- ' Illicenim residetoapitalisdomini
regis justitia, primus post regem in
regno ratione fori, et majores quique
de regno qui familinrius regiis secretis

assistant . . . verum quidam ex offioio,
quidam ex sola jussione principis
resident.' Dial. p. 8.

1 The author of the Dialogus com-
pares the days of account at the Ex-
chequer to a game at chess between
the treasurer and the sheriff of each
county. Dial. p. 4.

OF HENRY II. AND RICHARD I. 145

it we find the united burdens of the two systems pressing heavily on
the nation at large. In the roll for the 31st year of his reign,1 side
by side with the fixed ferm of the counties and the Danegeld, two
strictly national sources of revenue, appear the feudal payments for
reliefs, marriages, and wardships ; talliages on the towns are a part
of the annual account. From other sources we learn that the
marriage portion'of the Empress Maud was raised by a strictly feudal
aid. A very considerable proportion of the revenue was already
derived from the proceeds of placita, the profits arising from the
administration of justice, enormous amercements for offences, and
the sale of public offices.

Roger, bishop of Salisbury, was the founder of the organisation
of the Exchequer, and by his family it was administered, except Exchequer
during Stephen's reign, during the whole of the century. Nigel,
bishop of Ely, his nephew, presided at the treasury until the year
1159, when he was succeeded by his son Eichard, who held the same
position until his death in 1198. Roger le Poor,2 the son of Bishop Family of
Roger, was at one time chancellor to Stephen ; the names of Herbert poor' e
and Richard, successively bishops of the same see, and known by
the same surname, probably carried on the family connexion with
the Court and Exchequer far into the reign of Henry III. To the
pen of Richard FitzNeal we owe the invaluable ' Dialogus de
Scaccario ' ; to his father and great uncle the institution of the
enrolments of the revenue known as the Pipe Rolls, which contain
the only documentary evidence, strictly speaking, which exists for
the illustration of the constitutional history of this reign.

The business powers of Henry II. appear to great advantage in Henry 11.
his dealings with the Exchequer. One of the first measures of his Exchequer6
reign was to set up the old administration as it had been in his
grandfather's time.3 Bishop Nigel 4 was recalled to court and re-
stored to his ancient place. The enrolment of receipts was at once

1 Published by the Record Com- father was not likely to deserve the

mission in 1835. Edited by Mr. name of ' pauper ' in his youth, yet he

Hunter. has it universally. I am inclined to

8 Dial. p. 20. There can, I think, believe that Herbert ' pauper ' was son

be no doubt that the name ' pauper ' of Roger, the chancellor ; he was the

was first applied to Bishop Roger, and offspring of a concubine. Ben. Pet.

descended from him to his son, the i. 352.

chancellor. It is proved by the appli- 3 ' Porro super his te vidimus quan-

cation to the bishop of the line ' Pau- doque sollicitum adeo ut missis a

pertas tenuis quam sit fecunda latere tuo viris discretis de eodem

virorum,' by the author of the Dialo- dominum tune Eliensem conveneris.'

gus, who was his great nephew, p. Dial, de Scacc. p. 2 (ed. 1711).

20. And the historians who give an 4 See Dialogus, &c., p. 24, where the

account of his rise dwell much on his author gives a glowing character of

original poverty, although they do not the bishop,
give him the name. The son of such a

146

THE CHRONICLE OF THE REIOH8

Exchequer
account*.
I. The
ferm of the

The f emu
impove-
rished by
Stephen

proceeded with, and although it was not for some years that the
completeness of accounts which had existed under Henry I. was
attained, the order and method of the rolls of Henry II. are in
favourable contrast with the single remaining roll of the former
reign. Besides Bishop Nigel and Richard of Dchester, to whom he
gave a special seat at the exchequer board,1 Henry secured the
services of Master Thomas Brunus or le Brun,2 an old officer of king
Roger of Sicily, whom he made his almoner,3 and provided with a
similar seat, and who kept a roll of the Exchequer, and other pro-
ceedings of the king and Curia, distinct from the counterpart
enrolments of the treasurer and chancellor.

The first item in the revenue rolls of each county is the firma
comitatus ; the assized ferm or rent which the sheriff paid as
commutation for the feorm-fultum of earlier times. This source of
revenue amounted, if we are to believe Giraldus Cambrensis,4 to
60,000 marks in the time of Edward the Confessor, but had fallen
in the reign of Henry II. to 12,000 marks, in consequence of the
heavy charges granted out of it by both Stephen and Henry to
their followers. This statement cannot be strictly true. The ferms
were assessed certainly before the reign of Stephen,5 for in the 81st
of Henry I. they had sunk to the amounts at which they continued
throughout the century, the aggregate in the gross not reaching to
more than 12,OOOZ. From this fund, which was the whole of the
ordinary revenue of the crown, Stephen had drawn the endowments

1 Dialogus, p. 13. He had risen
from the ranks in the treasury ; being
mentioned as a scriptor in the roll of
the 2nd of Henry II., p. 30.

* Dialogus, p. 9.

* Froger, bishop of Seez, was al-
moner until 1159. Roger the Hospi-
taller took the office in 1177. Thomas
Brunus was an Englishman who had
been employed at the Sicilian court in
high office. On the death of the king
(probably Roger in 1154) he was invited
to England. His name appears in the
rolls from the 5th year to the 23rd.
In the 15th year, 1169, he was almoner,
so that he probably resigned that office
in 1177. See Madox's note on the
Dialogus, p. 17.

4 De Inst. Pr. iii. 30. ' Annui fiscales
redditus siout in rotulo Wintoniae re-
peritur ad sexaginta millia marcarum
summam implebant. Tempore vero
regis Henrici secundi, tot terris interim
militibus tarn a rege Stephano prius
quam ab ipso postmodum . . . large
utrinque datis, vix annui xii. millium
marcarum redditus fiscales sunt in-

venti.' He adds that the German
emperor has 300,000 marks per annum ;
and that the city of Palermo alone
yielded more to the king of Sicily
than all England did to Henry. The
use of the words terris datis in this
passage is technical. See Dialogus,
p. 14, and the Pipe Rolls, passim.

* Richard FitzNeal, writing in 1178,
could remember the time when the
ferms were partly paid in kind. Dia-
logus de Scaccario, p. 20. To remedy
the oppression incident to the system,
the king, Henry II., ' diffinito mag
norum consilio destinavit per regnum
quos ad id prudentiores et discretiores
cognoverat, qui circueuntes et oculata
fide fundos singulos perlustrantes,
habita rostimatione victualium quae de
his solvebantur redegerunt in summam
denariorum." This writer states that
part of the ferm of the county arose
from placita, of which the earl had a
third part, his third penny. But the
whole ferm, and the third penny itself,
had become a fixed charge before the
reign of Henry II. Dial. p. 31.

OF HENRY II. AND RICHARD I. 147

of his fiscal or titular earls,1 and the considerable sums which he
spent on religious foundations. The crown was thereby so im-
poverished that it is difficult to see by what means during the
middle and later years of the reign the royal state was supported,
unless it were by a heavy Danegeld. One of Henry's first measures
was to revoke these charges, and to restore them to their proper
purpose. The lay grants were resumed, but the church endowments
were beyond the king's reach ; and as these, with the necessary
provision made for his own family and followers, must be drawn
from the same source, the sum of about 4,OOOZ., to which in the
early years of the reigns the terras datas amounted, must be deducted
from the gross sum of the ferms. This reduced sum continued the
same throughout the reign, and agrees very nearly with the estimate
of Giraldus, about 8,OOOZ.2

The Danegeld, which had been always an odious tax to the English, n. The
and which, from its impact on the cultivated lands of the country, by Danegeia
its very nature repressed any attempts at improvement, had been
abolished by Edward the Confessor,3 and restored by the Conqueror The Dane-
in an aggravated form. The ancient tax of two shillings on the fhediCm
hide had been on one occasion raised to six. It had not, however, kings
become as before a part of the regular annual revenue, but was
reserved by William for occasions of exceptional urgency,4 so that it
is possible that the gross amount so raised was not larger than it
would have been if it had been collected annually, although in
a time when money was scarce the accumulated pressure would
be out of all proportion heavier. We are not informed by what

1 ' Quosclam imaginarios et pseudo- about the lower figures in a sum of
comites quibus rex Stephanus omnia fifty or sixty pages of Roman numerals,
pene ad fiscum pertinentia minus and I have preferred giving the result
caute distribuerat.' R. de Monte, ad in round numbers.

1155. The reference is to the same 3 The Confessor is said to have
in the passage of R. de Diceto quoted seen the devil sitting on the money-
above, p. 116. ' Bonorum occupatores bags. Brompton, 942, and Luard's
quae suam ad mensam quasi ad fiscum Lives, p. 307. The author of the
ab antique pertinere noscuntur, patri- Dialogus says that it was an annual
monio proprio contentos esse debere, charge up to the Conquest, and that
assereret, et etiam cogeret,' c. 570. the Conqueror discontinued it ; but
' Considerans . . . quod regii redditus see below. On the contrary, Stephen,
breves essent qui avito tempore uberes in his charter of Oxford (Brompton,
fuerant, eo quod regia dominica per 1024), says that it had been levied
mollitiem regis Stephani ad alios annually, and this agrees with the
multosque dominos majori ex parte Pipe Roll.

migrassent, preecepit ea cum omni 4 Dialogus de Scaccario, p. 27.

integritate a quibuscunque detentori- ' Noluit hoc ut annuum solvi quod

bus resignari.' W. Newb. ii. 2. fuerat urgente necessitate bellicse

2 These numbers are arrived at by tempestatis exactum, nee tamen om-
adding up the gross receipts of the nino propter inopinatos casus dimitti.
Pipe Rolls. I have been as careful as Raro igitur temporibus illius vel
I could, but it is difficult to be sure successorum ipsius solutus est.'

L2

THE CHRONICLE OF THE REIGNS

It becomes
a fixed

WM the
whole pro-
duce of the
tax paid
Into the
Exchequer ?

Question?
ag to the
Danegeld

WM It coni-

pouuded

for?

Proceedings
of the
Council of
Woodstock
lu 1163

influences this tax was modified l until we find it in the reign of Henry
I. a fixed and annual charge, bringing in the gross about 6,5002.,
but reduced by waste and by pardons to official persons to about
8,5002. It may be conjectured that this reduction was made in
consequence of the compact called the charter of Henry I., in which
he promises the abolition of all evil customs. If the number of
hides in the country was, as it is sometimes stated, 248,600, the
ancient Danegeld must have raised a sum of 24,8602. It is, how-
ever, more probable that the sums which appear under the head of
Danegeld in the rolls, and which were unquestionably all the produce
of the tax which reached the royal treasury, are simply the amounts
paid by the sheriffs as the ferm of the Danegeld. I am not aware
that this theory has ever been stated, but it would seem not im-
probable for several reasons. The great oppressiveness of the Dane-
geld of two shillings on the hide would render its collection a
matter of difficulty, and it would never be raised without consider-
able loss. A fixed sum, on the other hand, must be paid into
the treasury. It is possible that this sum was fixed on a low
average, and that the sheriffs collected as well as they could the
old tax, keeping for their own pay the difference between the sum
collected and the sum paid in. If this were so, we can account for
the fact that the Danegeld was still reputed in 1178 to be a tax of
two shillings on the hide, whilst the actual receipt of the Exchequer
was very small.

It may be questioned, however, further, whether the Danegeld
itself was not compounded before it reached the hands of the sheriff,
on the same principle on which forfeitures and reliefs were fixed at
an almost nominal sum in the reign of Henry I. A man who
owned twenty hides might be allowed to pay Danegeld for five, on
on the same principle that an abbot who owned twenty knights' fees
was allowed to pay scutage for a fourth part.

Some countenence for the theory may be derived from the
circumstances which are recorded by Becket's biographers as having
taken place in the council at Woodstock, on the first of July 1168.
On that occasion we are told that Henry wished to enter in the
Exchequer accounts, and add to his own revenues, a sum of ' two
shillings on the hide, which were given to the king's servants who
in the post of sheriffs kept the counties.' Thomas resisted this claim.
' We will not give this sum as revenue, saving your pleasure, but if the
sheriffs and the servants and ministers of the provinces serve us well

1 As to the alleged revaluation of
the lands by lUinulf Flambard, for
the purpose of increasing the Dane-
geld, see Orderic Vit. viii. 8 ; Pal-

grave, Normandy and England, iv.
60-61 ; Lappenberg (ed. Thorpe), iii.
226.

OF HENKY* II. AND EICHARD I. 149

and support our vassals, we will not be wanting in their assistance.' l Thomas
This tax can be no other than the Danegeld, and Henry's object may ^S*
have been to collect the entire sum into the treasury instead of the ^ wood-ng
miserable fixed amounts which were paid in by the sheriffs. stook
Whether Thomas appeared as the advocate of the sheriffs, who
would be the first losers by the change, or of the people, is not clear,
but the proposal to render ' auxilium ' voluntarily to the sheriffs instead
of payment does not favour the former supposition ; such a proposal,
on the other hand, comes with an ill grace from the statesman who
had substituted fixed payments for personal service in the case of
the scutage. The subject is one of the most obscure in the whole
of Becket's history. It is possible, however, that Henry's purpose
was simply to revive the payment of Danegeld ; and if this were so,
it was defeated by the primate's opposition, for no such tax was
collected after the eighth year of Henry's reign,2 the year preceding
the Council of Woodstock.

Notwithstanding Ralph Niger's assertion that Henry renewed Danegeld
the ancient Danegeld (a statement which may have been made in endTuder n
reference to the scene at Woodstock), it is certain that the abolition Henry IL
or permanent disuse of the tax is to be attributed to this king. It
was collected in the second year of his reign, in very nearly if not
exactly the same gross amount as in the 81st Henry I. From the
third to the seventh years it was disused ; in the eighth it was
collected in the same sums again, and after that it disappears until
the 20th year,3 when, although summonses were issued for the
collection of it, there is no evidence to show that it was actually paid,
unless the word is used simply as a synonym for talliage. It may Cause of the

r J J J & J abolition of

be fairly a matter of conjecture whether this practical abrogation of the tax
the tax was owing to a wish on Henry's part to prove himself a
worthy successor of the Confessor, or to a conviction that it was an
unprofitable, unpopular, and impolitic impost, a small portion only of
which reached the Exchequer ; or whether the facts that during the years
of Becket's chancellorship the Danegeld was not exacted, that in the
year of his resignation it reappears, that in the following year, after a
stout resistance on his part, it was finally disused, point to the
second martyr of Canterbury as the real deliverer from the tax,
which in its first form the first martyr of Canterbury, St. Elphege

1 This story is told by four of S. of Danegeld ceased after the second
Thomas's biographers with a strong year ; but he did not see the roll of
consensus. Grim, S. T. C. i. 21. the eighth year, which has been
Roger of Pontigny, S. T. C. i. 21. recovered since his time, and in
Gamier (quoted by Robertson, p. 329), which the receipts for Danegeld are
p. 65. Will. Cantuar. S. T. C. ii. 5. entered. Cf. Hist. Exch. p. 479, Ac.
Compare Robertson's Socket, App. IX. s Madox, Hist. Exch. p. 479.

2 Madox thought that the accounts

150

THE CHRONICLE OF THE REKHT8

III. The

donum and
•UK ilium

in 1156

Scntage,
hidage, an:l

Scatage on
the clergy
In 1166

had resisted to the death. The carucage which was levied by
Richard I. in his eighth year was, however, to all intents and
purposes a revival of this odious impost.

The next item of ancient revenue was the donum, or auxilium.
names which bear evidence to their original nature of contributions
by the vassals to assist the necessities of their lords. The former
term is applied to the sums raised by the counties, the latter to
those by the towns. This impost varied in amount on occasion,
and there is no reason to suppose that it was an annual tax. It
seems to have answered to what was known somewhat later by the
name of talliage, and in the thirty-first of Henry I. appears only in
the form of auxilium burgorum, being probably intended to be to
the towns what Danegeld was to the country.

The second year of Henry II. was marked by some variations
from the older practice, which may be ascribed with tolerable
certainty to the advice of Becket as chancellor. It was no doubt a
year of extraordinary charges, and one in which the more elastic
methods of raising a revenue by making up the arrears of legal
proceedings could not be brought into effective working. We find
in it accordingly the disappearance of Danegeld, coupled with the
new arrangement of the donum, which brought all classes of the
population under contribution.

From this time the donum may be taken as the general name
of the irregular impost. It was called also auxilium, from the
purpose which it was intended to serve, and hidage, scutage, or
talliage, from the mode of collection or special character of the
impost. The talliage or auxilium burgorum was levied on the
towns, the scutage or donum militum on the knights' fees, and the
hidage or donum simply on the tenants in socage. The peculiar
measure of the second year was the collection of scutage from the
knights' fees holding of ecclesiastical superiors, a measure which
met with much opposition from Archbishop Theobald at the time.1
The amount actually accounted for on the roll, as raised by this
scutage, was small, reaching altogether to not more that 5001. The
donum comitatus and auxilium burgorum raised the same year about
2,7001. The whole sum accounted for on the year, with the addition
of the profits of law proceedings and feudal incidents, is not much
more than 22,000£. The donum of the fourth year was collected in
a different form and in different relative proportions. It is possible

1 This is the scutage referred to by interim scutagium remittere non

John of Salisbury, ep. 128, in terms potest, et a quibusdam exactionibus

which would imply that it was really abatinere, quoniam fratris gratia male

levied to enable Henry to make war sarta nequidquam coiit, Ac.
on his brother Geoffrey. ' Verum

OF HENEY II. AND RICHAED I. 151

that we should connect with the scutage on the clergy in the second
year the ordinance which, as we learn from Robert de Monte,1 was
made in the third year for the war in Wales, that every two knights
or tenants in chivalry should join to equip a third, by which means,
if we are to understand it literally, 90,000 knights would appear
from 60,000 knights' fees. The scutage of 1156 was also for the
war in Wales, and may have been the share borne by the dignified
clergy of the increased burden borne by the knights in kind.

The term scutage, as is well known, acquired later the meaning scutage as
of commutation for military service, and the tax imposed for the war tion?orUta
of Toulouse 2 is commonly stated to have been the first occasion of ^r^c?
its collection in this form. For this payment a general levy of
revenue was made, and as this undoubtedly touched every knight's
fee, as well as any other source of income, it is called by the
contemporary historians a scutage. It does not appear from the
Pipe Bolls to have differed materially from the tax of the second
year ; the whole sum accounted for under the head of donum is
short of 11,OOOZ., of which the clergy and their knights' fees paid
8,700Z., the towns about 2,500Z., the rest falls under the head of
donum militum, or scutage proper, with a few miscellaneous contribu-
tions. It is singular that the mention of the war of Toulouse, or of
the commutation of service, does not occur in the rolls for this year,
and that Alexander Swereford, the compiler of the Red Book of the
Exchequer, supposed that the donum was raised for a war on the
Welsh marches. A second scutage was raised in the seventh year scutages of
(1161), probably for payment of debts incurred for the same war, Henrygii°f
the assessment being, in this as in the former case, two marks to the
knight's fee. It is possibly to the joint sum of these two scutages
that the words of Gervase are to be applied when he states that the
whole scutage for the war of Toulouse raised in England was 180,OOOZ. scutage of
of silver.3 If it was indeed so, the only conclusion we can come to Toeuiouse°f
is that the rolls are sadly incomplete ; but there is a roundness in the
sum that tempts a doubt. By Robert de Monte we are told that the
scutage of the king's foreign dominions was sixty shillings Angevin 4

1 ' Ad arm. 1157. ' Circa festivi- 3 Gervase, 1381. ' Hoc anno rex
tatem S. Johannis Baptists rex Henricus scotagium sive scutagium
Henricus prseparavit maximam expe- de Anglia recepit, cujus summa fuit
ditionem, ita ut duo milites de tota centum millia et quaterviginti millia
Anglia tertium pararent, ad oppri- librarum argenti.' See Hume, Hist,
mendum Gallensem terra et mari.' Engl. i., note P.

2 It was the scutage of Toulouse 4 E. de Monte, ad 1159. 'Nolens
which was alleged against Thomas vexare agrarios milites nee burgensem
Becket by his enemies (Gilb. Foliot, nee rusticorum multitudinem, sumptis
ep. 194), and which his friends thought 60 solidis Andegavensibus in Nor-
was the cause of his misfortunes. mannia de feudo uniuscujusque lories,
Joh. Salisb. ep. 145. et de reliquis omnibus tarn in Nor-

152

THE CHRONICLE OF THE REIGNS

Question no
to the
amount
railed for
the war of
Tonlonsr

Wales

Adi pur flllc
marier

Scntageof
Ireland

Scutage of
QaOowaj

Talliages on
taMme

to the knight's fee. If we suppose that Gervase had simply cal-
culated the English scutage at sixty shillings sterling, the sum
raised on 60,000 knights' fees would of course be exactly 180,0001.
We know, however, that the sum was two contributions of two
marks, that is 22. 185. -id. to the fee. This would raise 160,0001. in
the gross. But if the amount actually raised in the seventh year
corresponded with that of the fifth, the whole was not a fifth of that
sum. It is, however, impossible to come to an exact conclusion
without fuller data than exist even in the rolls themselves. We do
not know either the real number of knights' fees in England, or the
number on which the tax was levied.

Another scutage was levied in the eleventh year for the army of
Wales, accompanied by a talliage on the towns. The aid pur fille
marier in the fourteenth year, a mark to the fee, was collected in
exactly the same manner by scutage and talliage, but owing to
several causes was much more productive than any former aid.
This particular description of aid requires no remark ; it had been
levied before for the marriage of the king's mother, and was not
imposed in addition to other taxes.

It is in the eighteenth year that we find the scutage distinctly
taking the character of a commutation,1 or perhaps it may be called
a fine in lieu of military service. It was for the Irish expedition,
and amounted to twenty shillings on the fee on those knights who
sent neither soldiers nor money for the expedition. The only other
scutage of the reign was that for the Galloway expedition in the
thirty-third year, which was accompanied by a general talliage.

These imposts exhaust the list of the extraordinary taxes of the
reign, with the exception of the talliages on demesne, imposed in the
nineteenth, twentieth, and twenty-third years. The last of these
was probably expended on the preparations for war in France, which

mannia quam in Anglia, aive etiam
aliis terris suis, secundum hoc quod
ei visum fuit, capitales barones suos
cum paucis secum duxit, solidarios
vero milites innumeros.'

1 The account given in the Dia-
logus is tli IK : ' Fit interdum, ut
imminente vel insurgente in regnum
hostium machinatione, decernat rex
dfl Bingulis feodis militum summam
aliquam solvi, marcam scilicet vel
libram unam, unde militihus stipendia
vel donativa succedant. Mavult cnini
princcps stipendiaries quam domesti-
cos bellicis apponere casibus. Haec
itaque summa, quia nomine scutorum
.solvitur, scutagium nuncupatur.' It

had not yet acquired the restricted
sense exclusively, for the tax raised
for the redemption of Richard I.,
which was technically an aid, was
raised by a scutage. The goods of
knights or persons holding by knight
service of a superior lord might be
sold to pay their lord's acutage if he
was a defaulter, ' ratio namque scuta-
giorum milites suos magna pro partc
respicit, quia non nisi de militibus et
ratione militiae regi debentur.' Dial,
p. 62. This law applied only to
scutage (in commutation of service),
not to a simple donum, and not to
tenants in capite, p. 54.

OF HENEY II. AND EICHAKD I. 153

throughout the spring seemed imminent, the other two in repairing
the damage done in the rebellion of the year 1173.

This brief review is enough to enable us to estimate the historical statements
value of the statements of Kalph Niger and William of Newburgh. Niger and
The former states that Henry II. renewed the Danegeld, enacted Newburg^
new laws annually for the purpose of gain, and depressed nearly all
his subjects with scutages, recognitions, and other various forms of
oppression. William of Newburgh,1 on the contrary, affirms that
he never laid a single heavy burden on either England or his foreign
possessions until he imposed the Saladin tithe. The latter statement
is undoubtedly nearer the truth. On the other hand, William of
Newburgh acquits him of imposing tribute on the churches and Henry's
monasteries, although he allows the truth of the accusation of Ealph, from the*
that he kept benefices vacant for the sake of the profits.2 Possibly c
in William's estimation the consent of S. Thomas took from the
scutage on church fees its sacrilegious character.

The revenue raised from legal proceedings, on which Ealph Niger iv. Profits
pours his especial vituperation, constitutes from the time of the
Assize of Clarendon a very important item in the national accounts.
It does not seem, however, in any year to have reached the amount
raised by the same means in the thirty-first of Henry I. The placita
of the itinerant justices and justices of the forest begin to appear in
the rolls of 1166, the levies on purprestures emerging at the same
time. From 1175 downwards we find entries of the placita Curias
and of the Exchequer at uncertain intervals. Oblata Curiae appear
under distinct headings from the time of the establishment of the
bench in the king's court, 1178 ; fines for the transfer of property
from the twenty-eighth year.

The income arising from feudal incidents was, of course, so fluctua- v. income
ting that no calculation can be made to give even a fair idea of the incidents
average revenue derived from them. In a general view of the receipts
it would appear that Henry II. never approached to the oppressive
sums raised by his grandfather from this source. His reign is marked
by no great forfeitures except those of William Peverel and Henry
of Essex,3 both of which were strictly legal. The escheats and seizures
never remained long in the royal hands, whilst the regale in the case of
ecclesiastical vacancies was pertinaciously and even illegally exerted.4

1 iii. 26. remissi et languid! totis mundum

* William of Newburgh, iii. 26, brachiis amplectuntur.' A very bad

gives Henry's own defence of himself. argument, as the historian adds, con-

' Nonne melius est ut pecuniaa istsa sidering who appointed the bishops.

impendantur necessariis regni negotiis * B. de Monte, ad 1155 and 1163.

quam in episcoporum absumantur E. de Diceto, 531, 535.

deliciis? Nostri enim temporis * See, among innumerable proofs

preesules veterum in se formam mi- of this unconstitutional proceeding,

nime exprimunt, sed circa officium S. T. C. iii. 23.

154

THE CHRONICLE OF THE REIOHB

Henry's
BMMurai
for Moulin?
his feudal
revenue*

Moderate
amount

«PI>o.iriue
on ihc rolls

Method of

and collect-
ing taxes

Possible
employment
of juries

It is clear, however, that Henry watched carefully for every
opportunity of increasing this branch of his revenue. For this
purpose was issued the commission of inquiry throughout England
and Normandy into feudal services in 1168, which had so unfortunate
an effect on Henry's relations with the archbishop, and the same
was probably the cause of the inquiry entrusted to the sheriffs in
1177. A similar investigation in Normandy in 1171 is said by
Robert de Monte to have had the effect of doubling the ducal
revenue.

On a calm examination of the whole subject, it is difficult to
affirm that the nation was oppressively taxed during any period of
the reign. The amount of revenue accounted for in the last year of
Henry, or as it is styled from the fact that the Michaelmas of 1169
fell in the next reign, the first of Richard I., is but 48/781/., which
stands in favourable contrast with the thirty-first of Henry L, when
it reached the gross sum of 66,598Z.'

As to the mode in which the taxes were exacted and assessed we
know too little to make any categorical statement. There can,
however, be little doubt that the great council was consulted before
the levying of any extraordinary impost, and that the assessment of
the proportion to be paid by each individual was carried out in strictly
legal form. The sheriffs were not at liberty to collect the donum of
the county by oppressive means, but barons of the Exchequer made
their circuits for the purpose of assessment.2 It is certain that the
knights assessed themselves by declaring their own assisable estate
by a special carta stating the number of fees held by them of the
Crown. In the case of socage tenants the assessment was probably
made by inquest of jury, such as we find employed in the carrying
out of the assize of arms and the levying of the Saladin tithe. It is
possible, indeed, that this expedient was used only in the case of
personal property to which these particular cases apply. When,
however, in the reign of Richard I. we find a new assessment of

1 'Nullum grave regno Anglorum
vcl terris suis transmarinis onus
unquam imposuit, usque ad illam
novissimam decimationem, causa ex-
peditionis Jerosolimitanm, qua nimi-
rum decimatio in aliis aeque fiebat
regionibus.' W. Newb. iii. 26.

1 Dial. p. 23. ' Cognita summa
qua de comitatu requiritur communi-
ter ab iis qui in comitatu fundos
habent, per hydas distribuitur ut
nihil desit de ilia cum ventum fuerit
ad scaccarium solutionis.' In the
case of towns the donum might be

settled in two ways, either by an
apportionment to individuals made by
the justices, or by an offer of the
burgesses of a sufficient sum raised by
themselves. If they tried to excuse
themselves, inquiry was made, 'per
fidem vicecomitis,' as to their solvency.
Ib. p. 51. So we find the burgesses of
Horncastle assessing themselves at a
different sum from the assessment of
the justices, and the latter accepting
their decision. 14 Hen. II. Madox,
Hist. Exch. p. 407.

OF HENRY II. AND RICHARD I. 155

carucage enacted,1 the law orders it to be carried out by two servants Reason for
of the king, a clerk and a knight, who, with the sheriff of the county d0ensup
and lawful men elected thereto, shall, after taking oath, call before
them the stewards of the barons of the county, the lords of the
townships, or their bailiffs or provosts, with four lawful men of the
township, and two lawful knights of the hundred, who also are to
swear that they will faithfully and without fraud tell what are the
wainages of the carucates in each township : the moneys are to be
collected by two lawful knights and the bailiff of the hundred, who
are to account for them to the sheriff, and the sheriff to the Exchequer.
This act took place in 1197, but there are traces of a similar Earlier
proceeding at an earlier period. The inquisitions on which Domesday juries for
was founded were drawn up from inquests of two sorts : the first of j^es pur
the barons with the sheriff, the bailiff of the hundred, and the king's
officers ; the second of the villenage, ' six ceorls being returned from
every township, who, together with the parish priest and the town
reeve, also made their statements on oath to the royal commissioners.' '2
This was, perhaps, an exceptional case, but it was a good precedent :
as early as the reign of Henry I. the rights of the crown were
ascertained by an inquisition or recognition by a sworn inquest. In
the 14th of Henry II. we find the burghers of Horncastle, by per-
mission of the justices, assessing their own contribution pur fille
marier, and as this is incidentally mentioned the practice may have
been general. It seems impossible for the justices to have acted
without some such organisation as the jury. The form was as old
as Domesday, and the machinery for legal matters in perfect working.
The question is obscure, probably, only because the system was in
regular operation and required no notice from contemporary writers.
From its occasional use, we may infer its general applicability. The
importance of the facts recorded on the question of self-taxation,
representation, and the use of the jury can hardly be overstated,
but they belong more distinctly to the two following reigns.

Among the minor matters of the Exchequer business the coinage coinage
received a large share of the king's attention. Twice, at least,
during the reign a new currency was put into circulation, and very
strict measures were taken to preserve its integrity. In this respect
Henry no doubt felt himself to be carrying out the provisions of the
treaty by which the throne was secured to him at Wallingford.

1 Palgrave, Commonwealth, i. 275, was doubted or disputed, an inquest

gives the following dates of the fur- summoned. III. 16 Hen. III. Indi-

ther development of the principle of vidual oaths discarded, and inquests

assessment of personal property. I. impannelled for the township or

8 John. Every individual to swear hundred.

to the amount of his income, II. - Palgrave, Commonwealth, i. 272.

9 Hen. III. If the oath of the party

166

THE CHRONICLE OF THE REIGNS

Restoration
of the coin-
age under
Henry II

New coinage
in 11B8

New coinage
in 1180

We are to understand by this the restoration of the standard
value of the coin, the debasement of which had been one of the
charges laid by public opinion against Stephen : ' and the abolition
of the coinage of those usurping nobles who, among the other
royal rights which they had arrogated, had each for himself coined
money with his own mark. But Henry's measures went further
still. He abolished the local differences of the coinage which had
subsisted from the days of the Heptarchy, and instituted a uniform
currency for the whole kingdom. Further, by insisting on the pay-
ment at the Exchequer of the lawful coin of the realm only,3 he
threw out of circulation the debased money which was still current
in his foreign territories. His proceedings were not, indeed,
altogether successful : the next reign witnessed another attempt to
enforce a uniform system of weights and measures : even to the
present day we are experiencing how powerful local customs in this
respect are against law and common sense, as well as against the
empirical innovations of financial theorists. But the reformation of
the coinage was probably in a great measure completed, and it must
have been in the first instance, at least, a welcome change to a
nation weary of the debased, mutilated, and mongrel coin which had
afforded so much room for exaction, cheatery, and litigation.

The new coinage was ready in 1158. It is referred by Hoveden
to the year 1156, but it was probably a measure which required
some time for general acceptance, and was accompanied by very
severe measures against the fraudulent moneyers. These are men-
tioned in the rolls of the second year of the reign as punished by
mutilation. The first notice in the accounts, of Commutatio
MonetaB occurs in 1158 : the former proceedings were, therefore, in
all probability preliminary to a general enforcement of the act,
which, however generally welcome, would necessarily be attended
with cases of individual hardship.

The new coinage of 1180 was not favourably received,3 nor are
we informed of the circumstances which rendered it necessary. It

1 W. Malmesb. Hist. Nov. ii. p. 712.

* Dialogus de Scaccario, p. 5.
' Postquam rex illustris, CUJUB laus eat
in rebus magnis excellentior, sub
monarchia sua per universum regnum
nnum pondus et unam monetam
instituit, omnis comitatus una legis
necessitate teneri et generalis com-
mercii solutione coepit obligari ; omnes
itaque idem monetee genus quomodo-
cunque teneant solvunt." Up to the
time of Henry II. Northumberland
and Cumberland paid in mixed money.
Money in England might be pro-

nounced false on three grounds, ' in
falso scilicet pondere, in falsa lege, in
falsa imagine.' Ib. p. 6. The second
probably referred to coin discarded
and withdrawn from circulation.

* William of Newburgh, iti. 5, states
that it was owing to the debasement ' a
falsariis,' but whether this means
forgers or dishonest moneyers is not
clear : probably the latter ; he adds,
' quod quidem ratione utili tatis publicm
pro tempore erat necessarium, sed
regni pauperibus et colonis nimis one-
rosum.'

OF HENEY II. AND EICHAKD I.

157

may, however, have been required owing to the fraudulent manage-
ment of the moneyers,1 who were very severely punished, being
carted in fetters two and two to the king's court, where they were
compelled to redeem themselves with a heavy fine. An assize was
issued by which the payment of the old coin was declared unlawful
after Martinmas, and a new coinage was struck under the superin-
tendence of Philip Aymar, a native of Touraine. Philip unfortu-
nately neglected to restrict himself to lawful transactions, and was
discovered to be conniving at the villanies of the moneyers in the
Exchequer. The fact that he escaped punishment on this occasion,
whilst minor offenders were severely treated, is somewhat suspicious.
He was pardoned, and escaped by the king's connivance to France.2
But the same year, Idonea, a London lady,3 probably a Jewess, was pum?hment
mutilated for clipping, and her chattels, to wit, 9/. 5s. 4cZ. in money, f
five marks in blank silver, nine small gold rings, and three gold
fermailles, were paid into the Exchequer by the sheriffs. As late as
1184, one Eichard of Stokes was in trouble for using the old coin in
exchange contrary to the assize. And in 1189, the sheriff of Cumber-
land was under a fine for the same.4 The whole proceeding was
unpopular, and the leniency with which the principal offender was
treated is possibly to be explained much to Henry's discredit. Ralph
Niger, as usual, seizes on the opportunity for invective, and tells us charge
that the king, ' being himself corrupted by Archbishop Richard, the king
suffered the coinage to be corrupted, and, nevertheless, hanged the
corrupters of it.' 5

Henry's management of military affairs savoured strongly of Henry's
his favourite policy. Of the three possible systems, the ancient System7
Anglo-Saxon plan of arming the whole nation for the common
defence was not available for external war ; the divided command
and jealousy that pervaded a feudal host, and the short period of
feudal service, rendered the profitable employment of such assem-
blages almost impossible ; and the name of mercenaries was so
abhorrent to the English people that an attempt to support a
standing army of such materials would have been a signal for
rebellion. Henry acted wisely in the way in which he dealt with
these elements.

The adoption of scutages in commutation of personal service
enabled the king to call to his assistance only those feudal retainers

mutation

1 Even the carelessness of the
moneyers was very heavily punished.
Dial. p. 19. Although the writer
allows that ' in moneta generaliter
peccatur ab omnibus.'

"- Cf. E. de Diceto, 611. Gervase,

1457. W. Newb. iii. 5.
s Madox, Hist. Exch. 189.

4 Madox, Hist. Exch. 191, and note
to Dial, de Scacc. 21. Pipe Boll of
1 Rich I., p. 137.

5 E. Niger, p. 168.

158

TIIE CHRONICLE OF THE REIGNS

BoMfan

hired with
the produce

of th.
•cnUge

Feudal
master
in 1177

The feudal
military
system
continues
to exist

Henry's
plan for
training
the nation
to anus

Difficulties
of the case

The remains
of the old
Anglo-Saxon

military
system

on whom he might confidently rely ; the others were glad to be
excused attendance, and their contributions were more valuable than
their presence. The length of a campaign was no longer limited by
the forty days of feudal obligation, and the payment of the force
which consented to lengthen its term of service at the king's bidding
was defrayed from this source, or the native population spared by
the employment of Welshmen or Brabantines. The war of Toulouse
was thus conducted, the king leading to it his chief vassals in person
with small retinues, but an innumerable host of soldiers, solidarii.1
On one occasion, in 1177,2 Henry did make a grand demonstration
of the old sort, and collected the whole feudal force of the kingdom
at Portsmouth for an invasion of France, but on almost every other
occasion of foreign warfare he employed mercenaries. The cam-
paigns in Ireland and Galloway, which can hardly be looked on as
foreign wars, were fought by feudal levies ; but in the former, at
least, of these cases there was a distinct intention of employing at
a distance elements that were dangerous at home ; it was a case
of feudal colonisation and to be effected by feudal means. It does
not appear that Henry thought himself strong enough to interfere
directly with the rights of the great vassals in this respect. He
could dismantle their castles, imprison their persons, and make it
impossible for them to reclaim their longed-for capacity of making
private war ; but, supposing them to be at liberty and in possession
of their estates, he would have been infringing the fundamental law
of feudalism if he had attempted to meddle with their own relations
to their vassals.

It was his interest, however, that England should be a military
power ; only the leading of that power must be in the king himself.
It was necessary to foster a military spirit without giving it the
opportunity of being used to the prejudice of the royal power.
Happily, Henry saw a way, and had the means, of maintaining such
a spirit in the heart of the nation. If the national defence had been
left to feudalism, the country must have relapsed into anarchy ; if it
had been entrusted to mercenaries, a military despotism must have
resulted : if, on the other hand, the modern principle of creating a
national military spirit had been forestalled, England might have
become a nation of soldiers, a scourge of the western world.

The national militia, the legitimate successor of the Anglo-
Saxon fyrd, seems to have subsisted in its integrity until the reign
of Stephen.3 This force had helped to defeat the Scots at the

1 R. de Monte. ' Capitales barones Guienne, Anjou, and Gascony, were

suos cum paucis, . . . soliclarios vero there in person. Gerv. 1381.
innumeros." The king of Scotland, * Ben. Pet. i 168, 190.
a Welsh king, and all the counts and * Cf. Palgrave, Commonwealth, ii.,

barons of England, Normandy, ccclxxiii.

OF HENKY II. AND EICHAED I. 159

battle of the Standard, : and chiefly contributed to the suppression
of the rebellion of 1173.2 On both these occasions the conquering
army partook in great measure of the character of a tumultuary levy.
It was in the latter case the posse comitatus, under the leading of
the sheriffs whose fidelity the king had secured by the judicial
measures of the preceding years. But although this doubtless con-
tributed to the success of the organisation, it is clear from the history
that the freemen of the nation, the body from which this force was
drawn, were faithful to the king and instinctively hostile to
the feudal rebels. The same feeling also pervaded the town popula-
tions, and united for patriotic purposes the two elements which were
least likely to be deluded by the dreams of military glory, the
traders and the cultivators of the land.

It was perhaps from this experience that Henry learned the real Henry's
value of this force and the reliance to be placed upon them. And arm?e *
accordingly, when in 1181 he took measures for organising the
defence of his whole dominions against the ambitious yearnings of
Philip II., he included the whole free population in his famous
assize of arms.3 This legislative act was not confined to England,4
and its importance in this respect must therefore not be exaggerated.
It is the inclusion of the whole free population in the general
measure, not their distinct organisation, that is important. The
act enforced on all freemen the duty of providing arms according to
their capacity, beginning with the landholders and descending to those
who possessed ten marks in chattels, including indeed all burghers
and freemen. The proper equipment of each rank was defined par-
ticularly, and means ordained for carrying out the statute. The sale
and exportation of arms were forbidden, and the settlement of the legal
status of every freeman is placed in the hands of justices, to be ascer-
tained by the oath of lawful men of the hundred. By this ordinance
was consolidated and organised a force which could be depended on
to save the country from hostile invasion, and that class was trained
in the use of arms from which in after times the conquerors of Creci
and Agincourt were drawn. Subsequent legislation by Edward I. in
the statute of Winchester, Henry IV., Philip and Mary, and James L,
has served to maintain to our own day in the form of militia the
primeval institution of our Anglo-Saxon forefathers.-5

It is no wonder that Henry, whilst providing for the defence of

1 Richard of Hexham, 321. The 574.
archbishop of York ordered every 3 Ben. Pet. i. 278.

parish priest to attend with all the 4 Ben. Pet. i. 269, 270, shows that

parishioners capable of fighting. it was first published abroad.

Ailred, Bellum Standard!!, Twysden, 5 Cf. Palgrave, Commonwealth, i.

338. 305, &c., and ii., ccclxviii., &c.

2 B. Petr. i. 65, 68. E. de Diceto,

160 THE CHRONICLE OF THE REIGNS

England by the militia, and having rid himself of the hazardous
services and precarious faithfulness of the feudal armies, should
have availed himself of the use of mercenaries in his foreign
wars. Some portion of those in his pay were Welshmen,1 who had
taken service under him at the end of the Welsh war ; but the
greater part was composed of those fearful engines of slaughter, the
13rabau9on and Basque mercenaries.3 The use of paid foreign soldiers
had prevailed since the reign of the Conqueror, and these had been
generally drawn from the Low Countries which furnished so large
a portion of the first crusaders, and were known in England as
character of Flemings. In many cases they were doubtless soldiers formed and
Drained amid the hardships of the crusades, who had concluded their
salvation and rid themselves of their conscience by the same service.
But about the mercenaries of the latter half of the twelfth century
there are features that can hardly be traced to this original. Sprung,
no doubt, in the first instance from the lands whose names they bore,
they had practised for generations, it would seem, a trade of war,
recruiting their numbers by the incorporation of criminals, and by
the children born to them in almost promiscuous concubinage.
The historians of the time seldom speak of them without horror, as
constituting a race by themselves, without nationality, country, or
religion.3 The names they bore were not those of the Christian
saints ; they were excommunicated by the church ; they were
attached by no tie but pay to the leader who employed them, and
with him treachery and cruelty were the chief characteristics of
their relation. They were frequently led by banished or landless
lords, who, raising the sinews of war by means of plunder, were
eager to take advantage of any disturbance to obtain a settled posi-
tion. Henry, abiding by the spirit of the treaty of Wallingford,
abstained, on all but one occasion during his reign, from introducing
these mercenaries into England ; and in this he was warranted by
their employment on the side of the rebels. In 1178 the Earl of
Leicester, and Hugh Bigot in the following year, had introduced a
large force of Flemings into the Eastern counties. The former was
defeated at Forneham, and lost ten thousand Flemings in the battle ;
the latter was forced to submit by Henry himself, and his mercenaries

1 B. P. i. 74, ii. 46. R. de Monte, of these names they were condemned
915. in the Lateran Council of 1179, in the

2 Geoffrey of Vigeois (Labbe, ii. same canon with the heretics, the
328) enumerates the nations, ' Primo Cathari and Publicani. Cf. Ii. de
Basculi, postmodum Teuthonici Flan- Diceto, 590. R. de Monte, 923.
drenses, et ut rusticc loquar, Braban- ' See Gervase, 1461, who tells us
sons, Hannyers, Asperes, Pailler, that their camp was a place of refuge
Navar, Turlau, Vales, Roma, Cotarel, for profligate monks, canons, nuns,
Catalans, Aragones.' Under several outlaws of all sorts.

OF HENEY II. AND EICHAED I. 161

with reluctance suffered to return to Flanders. In this war the
count of Flanders was in alliance with the rebels, and the mercenaries
were, in a measure, protected by the character of belligerents from
the fate of pirates. Henry himself was accompanied by his
Braban9ons ; 1 but as they landed only on the 8th of July, and
embarked for return on the 7th of August, they had not time to
effect much mischief. It is here only that they touch English
history during this reign.

In 1181, Hugh de Puiset, count of Bar on the Seine, an ad- intended
venture!* who had been instrumental in introducing the Flemings
into England in 1173, proposed to lead a body of these troops on a
crusade. The pope, however, seeing the disgrace to Christendom
which would arise from the employment of such wretches, suggested
that the Mahometans of Spain were fitter objects for his zeal, and
directed him, as a work of penance, to lead his soldiers against
them : but the proposition fell to the ground.2

It is unnecessary to pursue them through the reigns of Eichard Prea com-
and John ; but it may be observed that they were undoubtedly the p
precursors of the famous free companies of the following centuries,
which were known by the name of Catalans, or among the Greeks
by the more heathenish name of Almugavares.3 It may even be a
question whether the mysterious proscribed races existing in some
parts of Europe may not be the descendants of some of these detested
bodies of men.

So many questions turn upon the character, status, and actual Henry's re-
powers of the Great Council of the nation, that it would be pre- the°&reat "
sumptuous as well as useless to attempt an examination of the subject ^uatum
in this preface. It does, however, occupy so prominent a place in
the annals of the reign that it is impossible to pass it over. Although
in several respects our knowledge of the subject is complete, it is
very difficult to draw from the facts any trustworthy conclusions.
We know the character of the persons who composed the assembly
the manner of their deliberations, the times of their meetings, and
the subjects of their discussions. But we do not know the actual
importance attached to their proceedings, and we have a very faint
knowledge of their real power in either legislation or taxation.

The persons who composed the assembly are described exactly composition
enough, ' the archbishops, bishops, abbots, earls, barons, knights, and council in
free tenants in chief of the king.' In this enumeration we trace a n'eYrjai.0
combination of the character of the Anglo-Saxon council with the

1 W. Newburgh, ii. 32. E. de Monte, 3 Gibbon, Decl. and Fall, c. 62, vol.

915. Gerv. 1427. E. de Diceto, 576. viii, p. 32.
- Ben. Pet. i. 276.

M

162

THE CHRONICLE OF THE REIGNS

MixeU
diameter,
feudal and
rational, of
these iv'sem-

Podtion of
the lords
spiritual

Teudal court. The archbishops, bishops, and abbots retained the
places they had held among the sapientes of the old system ; the
barons, knights, and free tenants in chief owe their position as clearly
to the land tenure of the new. The earls in theory fulfil both con-
ditions ; they are at once the comites, the gesiths of the old, and the
most important of the barons of the new system ; but as earls their
position was purely that of the old sapientes: they were neither in theory
nor in fact representatives of their earldoms in any other sense than
that in which every baron represented his own tenants. All these classes
were, however, feudal tenants of the king, for the few cases in which
foreign prelates and Norman barons sat in the English councils are
insufficient to prove that the king ever gave a place to one who had
not a right to it, either by his position in the church or by his tenure.
We can have no hesitation in identifying them with the proper
constituents of the feudal court of the king as Lord Paramount of
the land. But they are not the less the national council, the direct
successors of the Witenagemote ; the sapientes and sapientiores of
the nation. The two characters were perfectly compatible, and the
limited number of persons qualified to take part in either capacity,
and the abolition of any tenure which would allow of the existence
of a class of influential men not dependent directly on the king,
necessitated such a union. Whether, however, the legal status of
the assembly when it met was that of a feudal court or of a national
council, or both ; or whether the question of legal status ever
occurred to its members, or was clearer to them than it is to us, are
matters on which, as there are few grounds of argument, there will
always be abundance of discussion.1 The position of the spiritual
lords, who only could trace their right to seats to a period earlier
than the institution of the baronial tenure, and whose liberties only
were provided for in the national charters, saves the incipient parlia-
ment from the definite character of a feudal court. So long as they
sat in virtue of their spiritual office, the Great Council was a national
assembly. Of the other members there were none who did not both
theoretically and actually owe their places to the king, to their
position in his household, or to the tenure of their estates ; nor
could it be a question with them whether their place was due to
their personal, or to their official, or to their territorial qualification ;
the earls no longer represented their counties, the sheriffs, who
might in some measure have done so, sat, not as sheriffs, but as
tenants in chief of the crown. ^

It is not clear what proportion of the classes summoned actually
attended the councils. ExdeJJt tn the case of the higher members

See Hallam, Middle Ages, ii., Ac. Allen on the Prerogative, do.

OF HENKY II. AND RICHARD I. 163

we have no data for a conjecture. The knights and free tenants in Attendance
chief were summoned, but in the indefinite language of the chroni- sons sum-
clers we cannot find any basis for calculation. The immense multi-
tudes who occasionally are mentioned as attending are evidence of
the publicity of the whole transaction, not of the numbers of the
councillors. It is probable that few of the inferior tenants attended,
who neither were the ordinary suitors of the county where the
parliament was held, nor had business of their own to transact. The
theory, however, of a representative body was perfect ; each tenant
in chief representing and answering for his own mesne tenants,
although the principles of delegation and election, already in use for
other purposes, could not, so long as the council continued to be
summoned in feudal terms, be made available for this. In this
point the reign of Henry II. does not furnish us with details show-
ing any process of change. The exclusion from the court, by the
decree of Woodstock of 1175, l of those members who had been in
rebellion during the previous years, unless called up by special
summons, is construed to prove the adoption of summonses in this
reign ; but the argument is unnecessary, for the use of summonses,
not as a matter of law so much as of necessity, is clear enough at an
earlier period ; whilst the character of the summons, its generality
or speciality, is not touched by the case.

Henry began his reign with an attempt at least to maintain the Henry's
forms of the old constitution in respect to these assemblies, and a employment
similar feeling may be traced in the transactions of the years which
he was able to devote without interruption to English biisiness.2
These years were indeed very few ; out of the thirty-four which his
reign contained, not more than twelve and a quarter altogether, and snort
out of these only seven terms of twelve months consecutively, were his 'visits to
spent in England. The proceedings of these years may be taken as L
specimens of what his notion of constitutional routine would have
been had it been possible to carry it out.

I. In the year 1155 he traversed the whole of England, partly
for political, partly for judicial purposes. He held great councils Council* m
at London,3 Wallingford,4 Bridgnorth,5 Winchester,'' and West-
minster.7 We are not told whether on any of these occasions he
wore his crown ; but as they did not synchronise with any of the
great festivals of the church, and as the military character of his

1 Ben. Pet. i. 93. Cf. Hallam, :1 Gervase, 1377.

Middle Ages, Hi. 9. ' Gervase, 1378. R. de Monte,

z A general reference for authorities 880.

for the subject may be made to the 5 Chron. Battle, 75.

Itinerary, given in the Appendix to K R. de Monte, 887.

this Preface in the Rolls Series. ' Chron. Battle, 76.

sr2

164

THE CHRONICLE OF THE KEIQN8

In lit: and
11W
Henry
wears bin
crown

Councils in
11 63 and
1184

Council! In
1176,1176,
mid 1177

movements probably decided the place of assembly more than the
intention of reviving the old judicial placita of the three districts of
the kingdom, it is likely that he did not.

II. Between April 1157 and August 1158 was a year of internal
peace. During this period, and this only, the king wore his crown
and held his court de more on the groat festivals : at Pentecost, 1167,
at St. Edmund's,1 at Christmas at Lincoln,2 and at Easter, 1158, at
Worcester ;2 all either in the Danclage or the Merchenalage. After
which, the chronicler tells us, he wore his crown no more.8 On all
these occasions Great Councils were held, archbishops, bishops, abbots,
earls, barons, knights, free tenants, and people attending. A fourth
council was held at Northampton4 in July 1157, in which we are
not told whether or no the ceremony was performed. But it was in
all probability an important military gathering, and may have been
assembled for the further purpose of levying a donum for the Welsh
war.

III. and IV. The years 1168 and 1164 were spent in England.
Of the legislative importance of their transactions there can be no
doubt ; but we may notice, perhaps, as a feature of change, that the
councils are not called only to the provincial capitals, but also to
the penetralia regum, the forest palaces of Windsor, Woodstock,
Marlborough, and Clarendon. In 1168 we have assemblies at
Windsor,5 Woodstock,6 and Westminster;7 in 1164 at Clarendon,8
Reading,9 and Northampton.10 Of these those of Woodstock and
Clarendon were as clearly national councils as those of Westminster
and Northampton.

V. and VI. Between May 1175 and August 1177, councils were
held at Reading at Pentecost,11 at Gloucester,12 Woodstock,13 Notting-
ham,14 and Windsor,1-"' in 1175 ; in 1176 at Northampton,16 London,17
Winchester,18 and Westminster; '9 in 1177 at Northampton,*0 Lon-
don,21 Oxford,22 and Winchester,23 the latter a military levy and
council of war ; moreover during this period the king made two
circuits of the southern and one of the northern counties.

VII. Between July 1178 and April 1180 we have less satisfactory

Chron. Battle, 85.

Hoveden, 281.

R. de Diceto, 631. See Sir H.
El is's pref. to John of Oxenedep,
D. xviii.

Gervase, 1380.

R. de Anesty, up. Palgrave. Com-
monwealth, ii. xxiii.

R. de Diceto, 536.

Gervase, 1384.

R. de Diceto, 536.

R. de Monte, 899.
10 R. de Diceto, 537.

1 1). p.

91.

• B. P.

112.

3 B. P.

.93.

" B. P.

.94.

1 B. P.

103.

« B. P.

107.

: B. P.

116.

« B. P.

118.

» H. P.

124.

*" B. P.

132.

n B. P.

154.

« B. P.

162.

13 B. P.

178.

OF HENRY II. AND RICHARD I. 165

evidence ; but courts were certainly held at Christmas and Easter at councils m
Winchester,1 again at Pentecost ; 2 at Nottingham 3 at Christmas, "Jmso9'
1179, and at Reading,4 in Lent, 1180.

Nearly all, if not all, of the assemblies here enumerated were meet- Most of
ings of the Great Council of the nation. To many of them the strictly
attendance of the kings of Scotland, with their barons and bishops, council
and of the princes of Wales, gave the character of an imperial
parliament. In particular Malcolm, king of Scotland, attended a Attendances
court at Chester in 1157, at which he did homage, and another at ofScotkncT
Carlisle in 1158.5 During great part of the former year he was in
attendance on Henry and he followed him to the war of Toulouse.6
In 1163 he was present again and did homage to father and son at
Woodstock, in the council at which the Danegeld was debated.7
William the Lion, who succeeded to the crown in 1165, attended
the Easter council at Windsor in 1170,8 and with his barons did
homage to the younger king at Westminster the day after the corona-
tion. After his release from captivity in 1175 he was more fre-
quently in attendance at the royal councils. He was present at the
Great Council of Northampton in January 1176,9 and again at court
in October at Feckenham, and in June 1177 at Winchester. At
Christmas 1179 he was at court at Nottingham. He paid the king
a long visit in Normandy in 1181, in obedience to a peremptory
summons to appear in court to answer the complaints of his bishops.
In 1185 he was summoned to the council at Clerkenwell and
attended in person ; and in 1186 he was firmly attached to Henry by
a royal marriage ; four days after his marriage he sent his wife to
Scotland, but himself stayed for a council at Marlborough.10 He
was not, however, at the Council of Geddington, when the Saladin
tithe was granted, and probably never saw Henry again. The The Scottish
Scottish barons refused to join in the payment, and defeated an toe to pay
arrangement betweon Henry and William by which the latter was to t!thealadm
recover his castles.11 One of the first measures of Richard I. was to realty of
release William from his feudal dependence, and to restore the released
castles, in return for a sum of money to be spent on the crusade.
The attendance of the Welsh princes at the court was less easily
obtained, and Henry had generally to make an expedition into the
west to receive their homage.

Henry seems to have taken every opportunity to assemble these

1 B. P. i. 221, 228. ' R. cle Dice to, 536.

2 B. P. i. 240. » B. P. i. 4.

» B. P. i. 244. » B. P. i. 111.

4 R. de Diceto, <!10. I0 B. P. i. 351.

s Hoveden, 281. " B. P. ii. 44.
* K.de Monte, ap. Bouquet, xiii. 300.

166

THE CHRONICLE OF THE REIGNS

More Impor-
tant na-
tional bunl-
neoit : lejpil.
liii.mrial.
fetvlal, mi' I
military

Complimen-
tary consul-
tat ions

Private

questions

debuted

Di<l Henry
really auk
advice ?

He mitrlit
ilo It wltli-
out jealousy

councils, and to have asked their advice on every possible subject.
The most important of them are described as ' concilium de statu
regni et pace reformanda,' or ' de statutis regni.' Of this sort were
those of Berrnondsey in 1166,1 of London and Wallingford in
1166,a of Clarendon and Northampton in 1164, of London in 1170.
of Northampton in 1176, and Windsor in 1177. Financial business
was treated in others, especially in that of Woodstock in 1168, and
in the Council of Geddington in 1188. Others seem to have been
held chiefly for the reception of fealties, others for the inquiry into
feudal services, others for the organisation of the army. In all these
we can trace the proper character of a national as well as of a feudal
assembly, although the subjects were treated, no doubt, indiscrimin-
ately ; and they are constitutionally important.

Besides these, however, there were many in which matters were
canvassed on which even in the present day the voice of parliament
would not be consulted. The arbitration between the kings of
Navarre and Castile, the application of William of Sicily for the
hand of Johanna, and the reconciliation of the archbishops of
Canterbury and York, were referred by Henry to the Great Council,
and decided by him on their recommendation. In one particular we
gain a glimpse of an important constitutional point, when we find
the king asking of his council leave to quit the kingdom ; the cases
in which it is recorded may be merely complimentary, but the form
itself has considerable significance.

These details are in themselves quite insufficient to be the
groundwork of a theory, but they afford a strong presumption as to
the real relations between Henry and his council, the king and theJ
parliament. If he could have dispensed with it, his calling it together
on so many occasions shows that he wished to maintain constitutional
forms : if he could not, the fact that these assemblies were held so
regularly proves that he was able to carry on his government either
through them or in the most friendly relations with them. It is
probable that he could have acted without them, for the baronage
was thoroughly humbled, and the adherence of the people was
secured. We may infer from this that when he asked advice he
wanted it, and gladly availed himself of constitutional forms for
eliciting it. On the business of the kingdom it may be fairly said
that a strong government such as Henry's was is always amenable
to advice. Where there was no room for jealousy, good counsel was
much more likely to be taken than under a balanced constitution,
where each constituent is afraid to accept advice lest it should grant
too much authority to the giver. The difficulties of limited monarchy
arise from the indefinable limits of regal and parliamentary power.
1 Gervase, 1877. " GervaBe, 1378.

OF HENKY II. AND RICHARD I. 167

Henry was wise enough to know his own strength, and strong enough
to take good advice from whatever quarter it came.

Matters did not, however, always work smoothly. The question occasional
of Danegeld at Woodstock, and of the acceptance of the written
Consuetudines at Clarendon, are proof that the voice of constitutional Attempts a
independence, at all events on the church side, could still make itself Sonai resist-
hoard. It is needless to analyse the history of these contests. They a
are important as isolated constitutional phenomena, but they were
not decided on constitutional principle, nor directly conducive to the
development of constitutional liberty. Without Thomas Becket, it
is true, we might never have had a Hubert Walter, a Langton, or a
WTinchelsey ; but these men, when their time came, sought their
precedents not from the days of Becket, but from the earlier times
when the consent of the English people was deemed as necessary for
the election of a king as for the concession of a tax.

But however much the participation of the council in legislation Henry acted
and taxation may have depended on the will of the king, Henry did tcAoSt^
not assume the title or style of an absolute sovereign. His legal tlonil1 forms
enactments were passed in the presence of his bishops, earls, and
barons, and ' by the advice of his son, the king, and by the advice of
the earls, knights, and vassals,' or ' by the common counsel of the
realm,' or ' by the advice of the archbishops, bishops, abbots, and the
rest of the barons of the kingdom.' There was a well-drawn line
between the ' commune jus regni ' and the forest jurisdiction, which
was the arbitrary will of the sovereign : the very maintenance of
such a form was a protest against despotism. It was indeed a form
which had been retained during the most oppressive periods of
Norman tyranny, and when it was really only a form ; but under
Henry, in compliance with constitutional usage, advice was asked
and given, though not always taken.

The process of taxation was not often brought forward as a subject Process of
of debate, so far at least as our chroniclers tell us : it must indeed grantiug0a
have resembled the making of a parochial rate in the present day, tax
far more than the granting of a tax in the imperial parliament.
Men know that they must pay, and in what proportions ; direct
resistance is useless: the notice of a rate is sufficient without Process of
assembling a vestry. So in the twelfth century, the barons and carried'on
people knew that they were legally liable to certain calls and ^jfooutthe
customarily liable to certain others. These bore the names of gifts actio" of the

17 council

and aids, but were really taxes as irresistible as the demand for a
poor's rate. They were levied at certain periods and in ascertained
amounts fixed by law, charter, or custom. When they became
oppressive the people complained or rebelled, but their only means
of redress was to bind the king by new oaths, and to keep him to

168

THE CHRONICLE OF THE liEIOKS

them by force. The command of the purse-strings was not yet
acquired, and an extravagant king could not be set on one side like
an extravagant guardian or an improvident churchwarden. The
Great Council at its best, or on the theory of its most enthusiastic
admirers, was a very different thing from a constitutional parlia-
ment.

Sir Francis
Palgravp'*
view of the
reign :

as a period
of revolu-
tion

Sir Francis
Palgrare'a
theory of
t be reign of
Henry II.

His view

accounted

for

His argu-
ments apply
equally to
the reign <>/
Henry I.

In this review of the internal policy of Henry II., I have, as may
easily be seen, inclined to follow the old-fashioned view of the position
of his reign in our history, and not the more modern one propounded
but not demonstrated by Sir Francis Palgrave.1 It is not without
much thought and study that I have ventured to differ from so great
an authority, from one who combined so many of the qualifications
of the perfect historian — student, lawyer, and philosopher. But I
must distinctly refuse to acknowledge in Henry's measurej anything
that should entitle his reign to be called a second conquest, or to
allow that any great revolution was effected by him.

In the following passage the great historian gives some of the
grounds of his theory. ' It is most certain that after the accession
of the Plantagenets we find a very great similarity between the laws
of Normandy and the laws of England. Both belonged to one active
and powerful sovereign, one system of administration prevailed. It
was after one and the same course of business that the money was
counted on the Exchequer table on either side of the sea : the bailiffs
in the Norman bailliages passed their accounts just as the sheriffs to
whom the bailiwicks of the shires were granted in England ; and the
breves by which the king administered the law, whether in the
kingdom or the duchy, are most evidently germane to each other.
In all these circumstances I can find the most evident and cogent
proof that a great revolution was effected, not by William, but by
Henry Plantagenet.'

This is not an isolated passage, but a specimen of a theory into
which its illustrious author was drawn by under-estimating the
actual changes introduced at the Conquest, and the formal character
of the portions of the old system which were retained. It was
necessary to account for the phenomena of the later age by supposing
a period of rapid change, and for that later date the power and genius
of Henry II. seemed to account. But the arguments of the passage
here quoted amount to very little, and for the most part the indica-
tions apply equally to the reign of Henry I. In his reign the laws
of England had become so impregnated with feudalism that tho
element could not be eliminated even in the attempt to recall and
codify the laws of the older race. We cannot say that they had
1 Normandy and England, iii. 601.

OF HENRY II. AND RICHAKD I. 169

become Norman, because there are so few vestiges of Norman customs

with which they can be compared, and because the probability is

great that the kings, having developed a system of law or custom in

their insular dominions, rather assimilated the Norman practice to

the English than the reverse. The Exchequer was governed on

exactly the same principles in Henry I.'s reign as in Henry II.'s ;

and the Norman Exchequer and the English were under Henry I.

administered on the same plan and by members of the same family.

The actual forms of judicial procedure which were established under Henry n.'s

Henry II. are distinctly traceable under his grandfather, and although lrl°o\S- "c

the legal reforms of Henry II. run into details and have peculiarities tionary

which distinguish them, and even give them a true claim to the title

of original conceptions, they do, at least the most important of them,

distinctly retain as strong features of Anglo-Saxon as of Norman

parentage. And this Sir Francis Palgrave has himself shown even

whilst he ascribes to the heir of the Anglo-Saxon kings the final

abolition of the Anglo-Saxon legislation. There cannot be in the

mere application to novel disseisin and mortdauncester of the mode

of procedure which had been long in use for other matters, nor in

Henry's extending to his English subjects forms of process which

had been the privilege of his Norman ones, grounds for so sweeping

a charge.

Henry's genius as a legislator is exemplified rather in the character
application and combination of principles than in the origination of lation not3"
them. That his reign witnessed the amalgamation of the free of on^inatlve-
both nations is an evident fact. That it was the period of the more Question of
complete depression of the unfree is a theory that depends chiefly on England1"
our ignorance of their status, not only in the preceding, but in the ob°scure
following reigns.

A priori a period of despotic oppression, a reign of terror, like
that of Eufus, thirty years of rigorous systematic discipline like that
of Henry L, or twenty years of anarchy such as had existed under
Stephen, might seem a much more likely occasion for such a revolu-
tion as that of which Sir Francis Palgrave writes. But for the
revolution itself proof is wanting, and even if the phenomena which
are ascribed to its effects are granted to have such an origin, it seems
strange justice to fix for the period of its occurrence a reign in which
every recorded measure tended to peace and to the perfect equality
of the two nationalities. As for serfdom, far too little is known to
enable us to say what was the actual condition of the lowest class of obscurity of
the people before our formal records begin. We cannot practically vmSl" °f
distinguish between the freedom of a ceorl under the Confessor and
the slavery of the nativus under Henry II. : the former was in certain
senses bound : in certain senses the latter was free. We are not

170

THE CHRONICLE OF THE REIOH8

No sufficient
reawn for
charging it
on Henry II.

What did
Henry
ronllv abo-
lish ?

The feudal
influence in
government

Consolida-
tion the
(Treat f ea-
tare of the
reign ;

not rcvol -
tlon

Construc-
tion, not de-
struction

Combina-
tion without

• •onfa«iou

sure of the distinction between the villein regardant and the villein
in gross : we know that the mediaeval serf was never so low in con-
dition as the Anglo-Saxon theow. It may with some show of proof
be denied that personal slavery, or any slavery apart from land
services, ever existed in England after the Conquest. As soon as
the villein class really emerges 'in history, it is as a class whose very
disabilities imply corresponding privileges. But whatever were the
disabilities, and whatever were the privileges, the fact of their legal
position first appearing in the work of Glanvill is a very insufficient
argument for ascribing the depression of the class to the measures of
Henry II.

If the constitution o£-England had become so feudalised before
the Conquest that William had in the first instance little else to do
than to take the place of Edward, what is meant by saying that
Henry II. created a revolution by abolishing Anglo- Saxon legislation?
What was it that he set aside ? The system of Alfred or that of
Edward ? If that of Alfred, then the theory of the feudalism of
Edward falls to the ground ; if that of Edward, then was it really
his feudalism or his remnant of the old polity that was now abolished ?
Sir Francis Palgrave might mean the latter ; I should be inclined
to say the former. But whatever Henry abolished, he put in the
place of it a system compounded of the wisest parts of both laws ;
he developed and applied the principles on which the Conqueror
might have acted had the revolt of 1067 and 1068 never taken
place.

The length of Henry's reign, the comparative peace which the
country enjoyed during it ; the uniform direction of his measures,
the actual consensus of his counsellors, the ready acceptance of his
reforms, all combine to give it a character of consolidation, and of
power which, however highly we may be inclined to estimate it, we
shall overrate if we ascribe to it features which it did not possess.
It has every mark of a period of progress, of organic growth, of
steady development. It has none of a period of revolution. It was
destructive of Norman usurpation, constructive of English freedom.
Historically, it raised the people by annihilating their oppressors ;
made their interests for the time one with the interests of the crown ;
gave to the fabric of society a stability, and to the constituent ele-
ments of society a distinctness of character and definiteness, which
enabled them to recognise their relations to each other ; and when
the time came for further change, to distinguish friend from foe, to
combine without confusion. The nobility that Henry humbled was
that of Normandy ; the nobility that he founded was that of England ;
nor is it a mere ingenious calculation, but a proof of the real tend-
ency of his government, that whilst of the allies of the Conqueror

OF HENRY II. AND RICHARD I.

171

every one, either by himself or by his heirs, had incurred forfeiture
before the end of the reign of Henry I., of the signatories of the
Great Charter nearly every one owed his position in the country to
the fact that he or his fathers had been among the servants of
Henry II.

1 If Henry's character as a constitutional sovereign is to bo
estimated by his observance of the compact under which he came to
the throne, the considerations into which I have gone in the fore-
going preface ought to enable us to define it pretty clearly. He was
faithful to the letter of his engagements. He recovered the demesne
rights of the crown, so that his royal dignity did not depend for
maintenance on constant taxation. He restored the usurped estates ;
he destroyed the illegal castles, and the system which they typified ;
he maintained the royal hold on the lawful ones, and the equality
and uniformity of justice, which their usurpers- had subverted : be
restored internal peace, and with it plenty, as the riches of England
in the following reign amply testify. He arranged the administra-
tion of justice by enacting good laws and appointing faithful judges.
He restored the currency ; he encouraged commerce, he maintained

i 'resuion of
a new uobi-
Htv

Henry ob-
served tlie
terms <iii
which he
was raised
to the
i hrono

1 The text of the agreement by
which the barons bound Stephen to
rule, and also bound Henry before
assenting to his arrangement with
Stephen, does not seem to exist. The
treaty between Stephen and Henry
makes no mention of the compact, and
is simply a contract for the succession.
(Feed. i. 18.) The compact is described
by Robert de Monte (Bouquet), xiii.
296) thus : ' Quod dux post mortem
regis, si ipse eum superviveret, paci-
fice et absque contradictione regnum
haberet ; juratum est etiam quod
possessiones quse direptae erant ab
invasoribus ad antiques et legitimos
possessores revocarentur quorum
fuerant tempore Henrici optimi regis.
De castellis etiam quae post mortem
prsedicti regis facta fuerant, ut everte-
rentur, quorum multitude ad CCCLXXV.
summam excreverat.' Ralph de
Diceto (527) has the following : ' Re-
galia passim a proceribus usurpata
recipiet : munitiones suis [Stephani]
fundatso temporibus diruentur, quarum
numerus usque ad undecies centum
quindecim excrevit . . . Praediis as-
signabit colonos, insularios sedificiis,
nemoribus saltuarios, feris ditabit inda-
gines, ovibus decorabit montana, pas-
cua replebit armentis. Clerus nunc
demum dominabitur, pacis tranquilH-

tatem indicet, muneribus sordidis rion
gravabitur, ab extraordinariis vaca-
tionem habebit. Defensives locorum
seu vicecomites locis statuentur statu-
tis, non in votuni exercendse cupidi-
tatis abibunt ; non quenquam ex odio
persequentur ; non gratificabuntuv
amicis ; non indulgentiis criminal
sublevabunt, suum cuique reservabunt
ex integro : metu pcenarum nonnullos
afficient ; prsemiorum exhortatione
plurimos excitabunt. Fures terrebun-
turin f urea, prffidones sententia capital i
plectentur. Milites caligati gladios
suos in usum vomeris ligonisque con-
vertent. A castris ad aratra, a tentoriis
ad ergasteria, Flandrensium plurimi
revocabuntur, et quas nostratibus
operas indixerunt dominis suis ex
necessitate persolvcnt. Quid multis '?
Ab excubiis fatigatia communi Isetitia
respirabunt. Innocens et quieta rus-
ticitas otio relevabitur. Negotiator's
commerciorum vicissitude locupleta-
bit. Forma publica percussa eadt'iii
in regno Celebris erit ubique moneta.'
In this passage the legal compact
takes the form of a prophecy or joyful
anticipation. Matthew Paris (p. 8(1)
places the treaty at Wallingford, but
there is much obscurity as to both the
time and place.

172 THE REIGNS OF HENRY II. AND RICHARD I.

the privileges of the towns ; and, without encouraging an aggressive
spirit, armed his people for self-defence. He sustained the form, and
somewhat of the spirit, 'of national representation. The clergy had
grounds of complaint against him for very important reasons ; but
their chief complaints were caused by their preference of the
immunities of their class to the common safeguard of justice.
Henry's personal character, his ultimate aims, his principles of
policy, the very means which he used to carry out these desirable
ends, are matters of a different kind, to be judged on other principles,
and to be acquitted or condemned by a more competent tribunal than
distant posterity.

173

THE CHRONICLE OF EOGER OF
HOVEDEN. VOL. II.

[ROGER OF HOVEDEN was a clerk or chaplain of Henry II. ; lie was
connected with the North of England ; he was at one time a justice of the
forests. A considerable part of his work is devoted to the history of the Seo of
York, and to the history of Hugh of Puiset and of his family. It is sup-
posed that Roger took his name from the town of Howden. His work is of
great value to the historian, and was for centuries the principal store of
facts for the reign of Henry II. In the ensuing pages will be found
(1) an account of the death of Henry II., and (2) a sketch of the
relations of England with the Continent during that king's reign.
Henry II. was ' the greatest monarch of the time, the most cautious
politician, and the wealthiest man, practised in all the arts of the warrior
and the statesman, a man who never gave way, never truckled, never
missed his aim before, falls before the rising fortunes of an enemy whom
he despised as a boy, and the arms of a son whom he had trained to his
own humiliation.' Such is Bishop Stubbs's picture of Henry II. After
describing in eloquent terms the last scenes of the great king's life, the
Bishop shows how the foreign policy of England dates from this time,
explains the French, German, Spanish, and Italian policy of Henry II.,
and traces through English history the effects of the relations then
entered upon.]

HENRY had been in France since July 1188. Early in that year siu-chor
he had concluded his arrangements to join Philip in a crusade, and ^Hcnrv""!!
had returned to England to make preparations there. From England
he was recalled by the outbreak of war. Philip had made a pretext
of the quarrel between Richard and the count of Toulouse, to invade
Berry and take possession of Chateauroux. His expedition was
anything but glorious, for he fled at the very news of Richard's
approach, and did not attempt a battle. As the territories which he
ravaged were the property of Henry, the old king, after an ineffectual
attempt at peace, defied Philip and invaded his states. Several
efforts for pacification having been defeated by the inveterate mis- Tho winter
trust which was mutual between Philip and Henry, a truce was con- °ni8s
eluded for the Christmas holidays, to end, as was usual, on the feast

174

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

Henry's ill

new in thr

Last at-
tempt at
jieaco.
June 4

Philip con-
quers Maine
and ap-
proaches Le

Burning of
Le Mans

Flight of
Henry

The UnK's
companion-"

of St. Hilary. At the expiration of the truce war was renewed, but
in the meantime Richard had deserted his father and joined Philip.

Henry seems to have lost hope and energy. He was suffering
from a fistula, and depressed in both body and mind. He continued
at Le Mans with his court,1 but with no great force, during the
spring of 1189, the allies in the meantime devastating the border
territories, and the papal legate, John of Anagni, attempting to
mediate. But Philip believed that the legate was in Henry's pay,
and took advantage of his arrogance to refuse his arbitration. At
Whitsuntide a last attempt at peace was frustrated, and from that
date the stream of events ran rapidly.

The conference was held on Trinity Sunday. It broke up in a
more determined quarrel than ever. Yet Henry returned to Le
Mans and took no overt action. Within a week a Philip had overrun
Maine, and announced his determination to attack Tours. Still
Henry did not move. On the Monday week 3 after the conference
Philip suddenly appeared before Le Mans, and the royal forces prepared
for a siege, or at least for an assault. Stephen of Turnham, steward
of Anjou, in attempting to burn a suburb that might otherwise give
shelter to the besiegers, set fire to the city itself. A struggle ensued
for the possession of the bridges, and between the fire and the
French Henry found his position untenable. Unable to keep the
oath he had sworn to the Manceaux that he would never leave them,
he was compelled to fly, and leave his birthplace and his father's
tomb in the hands of the enemy. The few of his knights who could
threw themselves into the citadel, and held out until the third day ;
but Henry with 700 horsemen fled in panic before Philip and Richard,
and had it not been for the breaking down of the bridge over a stream
that the pursuers could not ford, they must inevitably have been
taken.4 It is here that Giraldus takes up the story.5

Besides Geoffrey the chancellor, Henry had with him
William Fitz-Ralph, the steward of Normandy, and William de
Mandeville, earl of Essex, and in his wife's right count of Aumale,
two of the small number of nobles who had been faithful to him

1 Gir. Camb. De Inst. Pr. iii. 13,
od. Brewer, p. 115. There were three
archbishops at court, Baldwin of
Canterbury, Walter of Itouen, and
Bartholomew of Tours, whom Giraldus,
in common with Benedict and Hove-
il'-n, calls William. It does not appear
which of the prelates was with bun at
lii.s death, but he was buried by the
archbishops Bartholomew of Tours
and Fulmar of Treves. R. de Dioeto,
til">. Baldwin remained in France
until the end of July, and it is strange

if he was not with his old friend until
the last. But I have no evidence to
prove that he was (Gervase, 1546) ;
and he certainly was at Rouen when
the king was at Azai two or three
days before he died. Epp. Cantuar.
296.

* Between Trinity Sunday, June 4,
and S. Barnabas's day.

3 June 12.

4 Benedict, ii. 68.

* Vita Galfridi, Angl. Sac. ii. 381.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN 175

during all the treasons and struggles of his reign. John was not

there, but his father had not yet learned his treason, and the rebellion

of Richard had probably strengthened his determination to make

him his successor. It would appear that the fugitives left Le Mans

by the northern of the two bridges over the Sarthe ; it was defended

by a strong fortification, which held out against the French for

some days after the citadel had surrendered. They fled towards They %

Normandy.1 The day was extremely hot, the roads narrow and

heavy : ? the flight had all the circumstances of a rout. The pursuit The flight

indeed was not carried far. The horse of Eichard, who was leading Mans,

it, was wounded by the lance of one of his knights, and he was thrown.3

Perhaps the stoppage gave him time to think, and he turned back.

At a distance of two miles 4 Henry was able to draw rein, look

back on the burning city, and bid it his last farewell. The farewell Henry's

was, as Giraldus reports it, uttered in the very spirit of blasphemous 1^1(^0°

defiance which was so characteristic of the Plantagenet temper.

' My God, since, to crown my confusion and increase my disgrace,

thou hast taken from me so vilely the town which on earth I have

loved best, where I was born and bred, and where my father lies

buried, and the body of S. Julian too, I will have my revenge on

thee also ; I will of a surety withdraw from thee that thing which

thou lovest best in me.' He said more still, which Giraldus thought

safer not to record ; then he continued his flight. Twenty miles 5 Arrival at

they rode that day, and towards night reached La Frenaye,6 a castle

of Henry's kinsman, the viscount of Beaumont, lying on the left

bank of the Sarthe, on the road to Alen9on. The castle was too

small for the whole retinue, and the chancellor wished to remain

outside in the village, in case of an attack being made by the enemy

in pursuit. But Henry seems to have clung to him with the

earnestness of despair ; he insisted on his coming in, and they Tho klllj,

passed the night together. Geoffrey had lost all his baggage in

Le Mans ; the king was a little better provided, and furnished his

son with a change of linen.7 The discomfort of the journey had

1 The words of the Philippis are ed. Brewer, 138.
clear as to the direction of his flight, 5 Philippis, p. 266.
although he did not, according to 8 ' Frenellas,' Gir. Camb. De Inst.
Giraldus, go so far as Alencon ; ' dum Pr. iii. 25, ed. Brewer, 140 ; and Vita
fugit oblitus fanise et regalis honoris, Galfridi, in Ang. Sac. ii. 381. I sup-
Donee Alenconis tuta se clausifc in pose the place to be La Frenaye.
arce, Continue fugiens viginti millia Giraldus describes it as containing a
cursu.' Philippis, ap. Pithoeum, p. castle, a municipium, and a ' villa
266. modica.' It is at the right distance

'-' Gir. Camb. Vita Galfridi ; in and in the right direction from Le

Anglia Sacra, ii. 381. Mans. See Stapleton's Norman Rolls,

3 Gir. Camb. De Inst. Pr. iii. 24, ii. p. xxxii.

ed. Brewer, 140. ' ' Interulam propriam et vesti-

4 Gir. Camb. De Inst. Pr. iii. 24, menta,' Gir. Camb. V. Galfr. 381.

176

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

Ho deter-

go Into
Anjon or
1'onrai iii-

Geoffrey
conducts
bis force to
Alen^on

Tliey meet
at Savlgny

Plii'lp over-
runs Maine

Conference

:.t Az:ii.
June 3ii

been very great ; many of the knights had perished from heat and
fatigue before they reached the place of safety.

They took supper together ; but after supper, Henry, with that
passionate waywardness which marks his failing powers, refused
to be undressed. He lay down on a couch, and Geoffrey spread
his own cloak over him.

In the morning, Tuesday, June the 13th, the king had changed
his mind. He would not desert his native province ; ho would return
to Anjou, and if he must die he would die there. In vain his
counsellors argued that his strength lay all to the north, that the
Norman castles were out of the reach and above the strength of
Philip. Geoffrey might lead the army, the scanty force that still
mustered round him ; he would go back ; he could go to Chinon.1
The nobles were forced to obey. William Fitz-Ralph and William
de Mandeville swore that, if anything unlucky befell the king, they
would surrender the castlos of Normandy only to John. The
chancellor was to see the force in safety to Alen9on ; then he might
rejoin his father. How Henry reached Anjou we are not told. It
must have been an adventure equal in secrecy and rapidity to those
of his best days, for all the roads were beset by Philip's forces.
Henry, however, knew the country, both as a soldier and as a hunts-
man. Geoffrey hurried to Aleii9on, and then, having assured him-
self of the safety of the place, took a hundred chosen and well-
equipped knights, and set off to seek the king. He overtook him at
a place called Savigny,2 thence they proceeded to Chinon, and a few
days later to Saumur.

Of the acts of Henry during the following fortnight we have no
record. He was probably suffering from his disease, aggravated by
the heat of the weather and the loss of rest. In the meantime
Philip was possessing himself one by one of the fortresses of Maine,
and announcing his intention not to rest until he had taken Tours.

There were on both sides many counsellors of peace, and it is
probable that several interviews were held between the subordinates
in the last week of June, for otherwise it is difficult to account for
the differences of the date of the final agreement, as given by the
several historians. But it is not probable that Henry, Richard, and
Philip met more than once again. An interview was arranged, as

1 ' Versus Andegaviam,' Gir. Cainb.
V. Galfr. Ang. Sac. ii. 381 ; Hoveden,
ii. 864 ; Benedict, ii. 68 ; Rigord, 185,
who, however, makes Henry fly direct
to Chinon.

* ' Savigniacura.' There are so
many places in Maine of this and
similar names that I cannot venture

on deciding which is the one referred
to. As the western part of the county
was less in Philip's hands than the
eastern, I should look for it in that
direction. But possibly it is the
village on the Vicnne, between Chinon
and Cande.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

177

Giraldus states, to be held at Azai on the 80th of June,1 but Henry
was too ill to attend. On that very day he was seized with fever.
Philip and Richard refused to believe that this was anything but an
excuse for delay, and although the terms of peace were proposed,
and probably accepted on both sides, no formal armistice was made.
Philip was determined to take Tours before he laid down his arms.

On the same day, the 30th of June, on a Friday,2 Philip appeared
before Tours ; Henry being at Saumur, and knowing himself to lie
at his enemy's mercy. The young conqueror announced his intention
of attacking the city on the Monday, whether or no Henry should in
the meantime determine on submission. One more attempt was made
to end the war. With Philip were his uncle, archbishop William of
Bheims, Philip count of Flanders, and Hugh duke of Burgundy.
The two former were now growing old men, and were better able to
estimate Henry's character and position than they had been twenty
years before, when they had been the chief supporters of Becket. The
count of Flanders and the duke of Burgundy were earnest and sincere
crusaders ; they both perished two years afterwards in Palestine,
Philip on his second pilgrimage. If the holy city were to be
recovered, peace must be made before Henry was crushed and
Christendom maimed of one of its mightiest members. Gratitude
as well as piety, and prudence as well as gratitude, may have swayed

July 2 ; Giraldus makes him fall ill at
Azai on the Friday before; William
the Breton makes him come from
Chinon to Colombieres on the Tuesday.
Again Hoveden seems to suppose that
he was present at the conference at
which the terms of the treaty were
drawn up; Giraldus says that al-
though he was at Azai he was sick,
and disappointed Philip and Richard,
who refused to believe the excuse. I
have tried to follow the sequence of
facts, arranging the localities as I
found the authority of the historians
confirmed by the relative position of
the towns where the events happened.
Chinon lies about halfway between
Saumur and Azai, Azai about half-
way between Chinon and Tours, and
Colombieres halfway between Tours
and Azai. If Henry were at Azai
on the Friday, he could hardly have
gone back, ill as he was, to Saumur
for Sunday; he would rather have
gone to Chinon. To harmonise the
statements is impossible, for Giraldus
clearly believed that he was at Azai
from Friday to Tuesday ; Hoveden as
clearly says that he was at Saumur
on the Sunday.

1 There is a consensus of historians
as to the festival of S. Peter and S.
Paul as marking the date of the
drawing up of the treaty. R. de
Diceto, 645. Giraldus speaks of the
conference as held in Henry's ab-
sence : ' sumpto inter reges colloquio
non procul ab oppidulo Turonise, cui
nomen erat Azai, feria sexta, rex
Anglorum eodem quo convenire de-
buerant die, apud Azai, lethaliter
acuta febri correptus accubuit.1 R.
de Diceto places it on the eve, June
28, Wednesday; Giraldus on the
Friday, June 30.

* The French historian, Rigord,
185, places the assault of Tours on
the 23rd of June, and the death of
Henry twelve days after. But the
evidence of Benedict, Hoveden, and
of Giraldus also, is clearly against
this. It is true that the earlier date
would give more room for the other-
wise crowded action of the week ; but
Rigord is not so exact a chronicler,
nor so nearly contemporary, as the
others. It is impossible altogether to
reconcile the statements of the dif-
ferent writers. Hoveden and Benedict
place Henry at Saumur on Sunday

Henry
seized with
fever

Philip ap-
proaches
Tours, Fri-
day, June 30

Visit of the
French
nobles to
Henry at
Saumur,
July 2

They were
inclined to
mediate

178

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

Philip takes
Tours, Mon-
day, July 3

Henry goes
to Azai

Conference
at Colom-
bieres, Tues-
day, July 4

Henry's
rtubmiggion.

them. Henry had more than once interfered to save them; it
would not be well that Philip should become too powerful. The
year before they had mediated successfully, and vowed to desert
Philip if he would not agree to peace. Against his will they visited
Henry on the Sunday at Saumur. We have no record of the
conversation ; they had no authority to make terms other than were
determined on the Friday before.

On the Monday Philip assaulted Tours : it was defended by a
scanty force, and its natural strength was not sufficient to counter-
balance the deficiency. The Loire was half dried up by the
continued heat, and on the river-side the ladders of the besiegers
were planted. It surrendered the same day.

And now Henry nerved himself for an interview which he knew
could have but one issue. Ill as he was, he moved from Saumur to
Azai, and in the plain of Colombieres l met Philip and Richard on
the day after the capture of Tours.9

Henry, notwithstanding his fistula and his fever, was able to sit
on horseback. His son Geoffrey had begged leave of absence, that he
might not see the humiliation of his father ; 3 but many of his other
nobles, and probably two of his three archbishops, rode beside him.4
The terms which he had come to ratify had been settled beforehand.
He had but to signify his acceptance of them by word of mouth.
They met face to face, the unhappy father and the undutiful son.
It was a clear sultry day, a cloudless sky and still air.5 As the
kings advanced towards one another a clap of thunder was heard,
and each drew back. Again they advanced, and again it thundered
louder than before. Henry, wearied and excited, was ready to faint.
His attendants held him up on his horse, and so he made his sub-
mission. He had but one request to make ; it was for a list of the
conspirators who had joined with Richard to forsake and betray him.
The list was promised, and he returned to Azai. Before he parted
with Richard he had to give him the kiss of peace ; he did so, but

He mentions Colombian's expressly as
the place. The day is fixed by the
statement ' post triduum,' which is
confirmed by Matthew Paris. I quoted
Rigord by memory, and forgot to verify
the reference. Philippis, p. 268 ; M.
Paris (ed. Wats), p. 151. According
to Qiraldus, the conference between
Philip and Henry took place on the
day after the capture of Tours.

3 Gir. Camb. Vita Oalfr., Ang. Sac.
ii. 381.

4 Archbishop Baldwin was at Rouen :
Epp. Cantuar. 296.

* Hoveden, Rolls Series, vol. ii.
p. 366.

1 ' Anglicus interea pacem rogat, et

licet aegra

Febre laboraret, calkin Chinone
relicta

Usque Columbare pro pacis
amore venire
Sustinuit.'

Philippis, ap. Pith. p. 268.
* At p. 365 of this volume (Rolls
Series), and, I am sorry to say, twice in
the second volume of Benedict of Peter-
borough, I have given Rigord as the
authority for this statement. Both
place and day are derived from the
Philippis of William the Breton, which
occurs in the same volume with Rigord.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN 179

the rebellious son heard his father whisper, and was not ashamed to
repeat it as a jest to Philip's ribald courtiers, ' May God not let me
die until I have taken my due vengeance on thee.' l

But not even his submission and humiliation procured him rest.
Among the minor vexations of the last months had been the
pertinacious refusal of the monks of Canterbury 2 to obey the arch-
bishop in certain matters in which they believed their privileges to
be infringed. Henry had, as usual with him in questions of ecclesi-
astical law, taken a personal interest in the matter, and had not Visit °f the
scrupled to back the archbishop with arms at Canterbury and Canterbury
support of a still more effective kind at Borne. A deputation from Azaienry a<
the convent, sent out in the vain idea that Henry's present mis-
fortunes would soften his heart towards them, had been looking for
him for some days. They found him at Azai,3 most probably on
his return from the field of Colombieres. ' The convent of Canter-
bury salute you as their lord,' was the greeting of the monks.
' Their lord I have been, and am still, and will be yet,1 was the
king's answer ; ' small thanks to you, ye traitors,' he added below
his breath.4 One of his clerks prevented him from adding more
invective. He bethought himself probably that even now the justi-
ciar was asking the convent for money towards the expenses of the
war ; he would temporise, as he had always seemed to do with them.
4 Go away, and I will speak with my faithful,' he said when he had
heard their plea. He called William of S. Mere 1'Eglise, one of the
chiefs of the chancery, and ordered him to write in his name. The
letter is extant,5 and is dated at Azai. It is probably the last
document he ever issued. It begins, ' Henry, by the grace of God
king of England, duke of Normandy and Aquitaine, and count of
Anjou, to the convent of Christ Church, Canterbury, greeting, and
by God's mercy on his return to England, peace.' The substance of The king's
the letter is, that the monks should take advantage of the delay in canterbury
his return to reconsider their position, and the things that make for

1 Gir. Camb. De Inst. Pr. iii. 26, Fontevraud. We are not told the
ed. Brewer, p. 150. exact day of the burial, but it could

2 The whole story of the dispute is scarcely have been before Saturday,
in Gervase ; and the letters written on which day Giraldus seems to place
on the subject are in the Epistolcc it, V. Galfr. p. 382. If I am wrong
Cantiutrienses, which form the second in supposing the king to have gone
volume of my Memorials of Richard I. from Saumur to Azai on Monday, or

3 This is certain from the date of early on Tuesday, the interview with
the letter issued by the king, and the monks may have taken place two
from Gervase, c. 1544. The latter or three days earlier.

author distinctly says that he died 4 Epp. Cantuar. p. 295.

and was buried within a week of his 5 Epp. Cantuar. p. 297 ; Gervase,

interview with the monks. He died c. 1545. Gervase omits the peculiar

on Thursday July 6th, and on the words of the salutation.

following day the funeral started for

180

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDES

He receive*
the list of
the traitors :
and hears
the name of
John

Hie despair

He moves
from Azai to

Cliinon

Stories of
his caning

hi- son.-

Qiraldus'g
account of
the last days

peace, that they might find an easier way out of their difficulties
when he should come. The monks, delighted with their success,
retired, and the king lay down to rest. It was then, probably, that
the fatal schedule was brought him,1 which he had so unwisely
demanded at Colombieres. It was drawn up in the form of a release
from allegiance ; all who had adhered to Richard were allowed to
attach themselves henceforth to him, in renunciation of the father's
right over them.2 He ordered the names to be read. The first on
the list was that of John. The sound of the beloved name startled
him at once. He leaped up from his bed as one beside himself, and
looking round him with a quick troubled glance exclaimed, ' Is it
true that John, my very heart, the best beloved of all my sons, for
whose advancement I have brought upon me all this misery, has
forsaken me ? ' The reader had no other answer to make than to
repeat the name. Henry saw that it was on the list, and threw
himself back on the couch. He turned his face to the wall, and
groaned deeply. ' Now,' he said, ' let all things go what way they
may ; I care no more for myself nor for the world.' His heart was
broken, and his death-blow struck.

He could not, however, remain at Azai. His people carried him
in a litter to Chinon,3 where Geoffrey was waiting for him. It was
the fifth day of the fever, and in all probability he was delirious with
the excitement of the morning. It was remembered and reported
in England that after he was brought to Chinon he cursed the day
on which he was born,4 and invoked God's malison on his sons :
the bishops and priests about him implored him to revoke the curse,
but he refused. But Giraldus, bitter enemy as he was, somewhat
softened by his misfortune, tells a different tale. He draws the
picture of the dying king leaning on Geoffrey's 5 shoulder whilst
one of his knights held his feet in his lap. Geoffrey was fanning
the flies from the king's face, as he seemed to be sleeping. As they
watched, the king revived and opened his eyes. He looked at Geoffrey
and blessed him. ' My son,' he said, ' my dearest, for that thou
hast ever striven to show towards me such faithfulness and gratitude
as son could show to father, if by God's mercy I shall recover of this
sickness, I will of a surety do to thee the duty of the best of fathers,
and I will set thee among the greatest and mightiest men of my
dominion. But if I am to die without requiting thee, may God,
who is the author and rewarder of all good, reward thee, because in

1 He was still at Azai, Hoveden,
p. 366. Of. Gir. Camb. De Inst. Pr.
iii. 25, ed. Brewer, p. 148.

1 Gir. Camb. I.e.

1 Hoveden, 366; Gir. Camb. V.

Galfr., Ang. Sao. ii. 381.

4 Hoveden, ii. 366 ; M. Paris, 151.

5 Gir. Camb. V. Galfr., Ang. Sac.,
ii. 381

THE CHKONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

181

every fortune alike them hast shown thyself to me so true a son.
Geoffrey, of whose sincere sorrow there can be no doubt, was over- Geoffrey's
whelmed with tears. He could but reply that all he prayed for was tipns with
his father's health and prosperity. Another day passed, and the
king's strength visibly waned. He kept crying at intervals, ' Shame,
shame on a conquered king.' x At last, when Geoffrey was again by
his side, the poor king kept telling him how he had destined him for
the see of York, or, if not York, Winchester ; 2 but now he knew that
he was dying. He drew off his best gold ring with the device of the
panther, and bade him send it to his son-in-law, the king of Castile ;
and another very precious ring, with a sapphire of great price and
virtue, he ordered to be delivered out of his treasure. Then he
desired that his bed should be carried into the chapel, and placed
before the altar.3 He had strength still to say some words of con- The king's
f ession, and received ' the Communion of the Body and Blood of the a
Lord with devotion.' And so he died, on the seventh day of the July 6
fever,4 on the sixth of July, the octave of the apostles Peter and

Paul.

******

There is a branch of politics without some consideration of
which our view of the reign and of the value of its historians would
be very imperfect. I will point out very briefly the ways in which
the foreign policy of England during the middle ages was affected
by the circumstances, the acts, and the alliances of the first king of
the house of Anjou.

It is scarcely an exaggeration to say that England owes her
introduction into the family of European nations to the Norman
Conquest. Almost all her previous intercourse with the continent
had been of that personal and occasional sort which, although it
helps to increase acquaintance, has little in common either with
the dynastic policy of kings or the political action of nations. It is
the first step indeed, but only a step towards it. The early inter-
marriages of the house of Wessex with the Karlings, and the later
ones with the families of the Saxon and Franconian emperors ; the
momentary jealousy of Charles and Offa, that of Lewis and Kenulf 5
(if it were more than a mere verbal bravado) ; the travels of Ethel-
wulf and Alfred ; the wanderings of the children and grandchildren
of Ethelred ; the long list of pilgrimages to Eome and Jerusalem

The foreign

E^La

thiiffim£m

isolation of
be^ore'the

°

Englishmen

forre°thebe'
Con<iuest

1 Gir. Camb. De Inst. Pr. iii. 26,
ed. Brewer, p. 150.

2 Gir. Camb. V. Galfr., Ang. Sac.
ii- 382.

septima; die videlicet quern physici
criticum vocant.' Gir. Camb. De
Inst. Pr. iii. 26, ed. Brewer, p. 150.
» Kemble, Codex Dipl. i. 281.

3 This is mentioned, I think, only Compare this with the letters of

by Hoveden, ii. 367.

4 ' feria quinta, et a quo decubuit

Leo III. to Charles, in Mansi, xiii.
969, 974.

182

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

Intercourse
uiftiutainc-l
by the
churches
only oc-
casional

Isolation of
the English
church at
this period

Canute
brings Eng-
land more
prominently
into

European
society

that stretches through the whole of the Anglo-Saxon annals from
Willibald to Ealdred and Sweyn, from Ina to Harold and Tostig : all
these had done little more than remind the struggling powers of the
' dark ' ages, that in the Northern Sea, separated in language and
laws from the races that had fallen and risen under the spell of
Rome, lay two islands full of Christian men and churches, that had
their wars and peace, their councils and policy, almost entirely to
themselves.

In one respect indeed there was an apparent and an obvious ex-
ception to this general severance : from the first ages of the Con-
version some sort of intercourse had been maintained between the
churches. But even this was scanty, interrupted, and exceptional.
Northumbria by her missions to Friesland, Wessex by the gift of
Boniface to Germany, had done something to fulfil the duty of
children to the parent land. Alcuin had more than repaid the debt
under which, two centuries before, the Franco- Galilean church had
laid the infant Christianity of the Heptarchy. One or two literary
friendships continued to throw a ray of light across the gloom of
the ninth century. Once or twice a legate is admitted from Rome,
but as an inquirer or an ambassador, not yet as a judge ; from time
to time an archbishop crosses the Alps and is entertained at the
Lateran. From Fleury and S. Omer we had imported an unwelcome
and unseasonable monachism ; and later on had even drawn a new
system of education from the colleges of Lorraine. But there was
little in common between the ascetic prelates and pious witan of
England and the secularised bishops and disloyal politicians of
France and Germany ; little harmony of feeling between the scholars
of Bede, Alcuin, Alfred, and Elfric, and the schools, moral, political,
or intellectual, that produced a Hildebrand or an Adalbert English
bishops were a greater novelty in a council of France or Rome than
their British predecessors had been at Aries and Rimini, or the
names of Anglo-Saxon saints in the calendar of Lanfranc. From
the Conquest this isolation ceases.

Like many other features of our national character, this, in the
age immediately preceding the Conquest, seemed to be undergoing a
change. The reign of Canute had put his English kingdom in close
connexion with Northern Europe ; a relation which, beginning under
a prince who possessed a larger stake on the continent than any other
who ever ruled in England, might have resulted in some such effects
as followed the union with Normandy. But in this case the dura-
tion of the connexion was so short, and the point of conjunction so
far removed from the focus of political life, both in religion and in
secular matters, and the English policy of Canute was so English,
that, in spite of his statesmanlike and cosmopolitan instincts, no such

THE CHKONICLE OF KOGEK OF HOVEDEN 183

results followed. Again under Edward the Confessor England Ana Edward
seemed first to advance towards and then to retire from intimacy
with her foreign sisters. Edward's wandering life had made him
familiar with the manners and cities of many men ; and although
he came back to his island throne little wiser than when he left it,
having learned only what had better have been forgotten, his people
were awakened somewhat rudely to the fact that there were other
nations than Danes and Norsemen who felt a vivid interest in their
fertile lands and cunning goldsmiths' work. From Lorraine and
Saxony poured in strange bishops ; from Normandy and Flanders Political
came noble adventurers with old Teutonic names, but Frenchmen in theEngHsh
manners and intrigue ; now each political party at home sought allies ?|^£iunder
and a fulcrum in some foreign court : one in Normandy, one in
Flanders, one in Denmark ; the king himself most naturally in the
imperial house. It was from Germany perhaps that he had learned
to admire the relations of Henry II. and Cunegunda,1 and to see in
their Bamberg a pattern for his own Westminster.2 But just as
feudalism itself, although matters had been verging upon it so long,
came on England at last per saltum, the result of sudden invasion,
not the outgrowth of natural causes regularly developed ; so, when
the time came for her to step into the whirlpool of European
interests, the impulse came from without, the step was taken at the The con-
time and as a consequence of the Conquest. Henceforth, instead of reafstarting-
associating with other nations in casual, personal, or occasional pomt
interests only, she was to take her place as a player in the great game.

Not less than by the mere fact of the Conquest, this result was importance
affected by the character of the conquering house, by the condition sade's^i/this
of Europe itself, and by the nature of the great enterprise which had view
for its chief consequence the bringing the nations face to face with
each other — the first Crusade. Of this latter influence it is almost
as difficult to overrate the importance as it is that of the Conquest
itself ; but whether or no England would without the Norman
dynasty be drawn into the Crusade — and throughout the Crusades,
in their whole duration, there is a thread of English distinct from English as
Norman or Angevin interest — it was by that connexion that it was wTthifor
in fact so involved. It is a consequence of the Conquest, not one of j^JtsTu the
a set of co-ordinate causes. Crusades

It might seem more natural to fix our date at the reign of Henry I.
It was nearest to the Crusade ; it was the earliest point at which the

1 Vita Henrici, Canis, Lect. iii. Gunhilda, the first wife of Henry III.

p. 2, p. 31. is called by the biographer of Edward

• I dare not venture to affirm that (ed. Luard, 395) Edward's sister.

Edward ever was in Germany, but She was the daughter of Canute and

the evidence for his political con- Emma,
nexion with that country is abundant.

18-1

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

Henry I.'i
relation to
the powers
of Europe a
result of
hi* father'*

Everything
of the kind
traceable to
the Con-
quest itself

The histori-
cal method
preferable
In dealing
with these
questions

public mind of England could have been consulted on foreign politics,
for under the Williams national thought in Norman as in Englishman
was in abeyance, and Henry by his relations with France and
Flanders, by the marriage of his daughter with Henry V., and that
influence over his son-in-law which led to the belief that by his
advice the emperor was about to tax the empire on the plan of
Domesday Book,1 clearly exercised an important weight in con-
tinental politics. But Henry's position in Europe, dignified as it
was, resulted in great measure from his father's policy, and sprang
altogether from that startling success which had roused France into
terrified jealousy, and spread into further Europe the panic fear that
William Bostar, the chosen of Alexander and Hildebrand, was going
to descend upon the empire like Alaric or Attila, or as a little later
the Normans did on Apulia, at the papal invitation, a scourge at
once of schism and civilisation. But it is to the Conquest itself, as
including all the other secondary impulses, that we may trace every-
thing distinctive in the change. By it the church is brought into
close connexion with Borne, and the nation in its political aspect,
after a short apprenticeship in the quarrels of French and Flemish
provincial sovereigns, takes that place in European parties which,
for good or evil, it has retained with little change of attitude for
seven hundred years, and more or less to the present day.

It would, I am aware, be more in accordance with the philosophy
of history to base the relations which subsisted between England
and France during the latter middle ages upon general principles,
by a reference to those general laws which are so convenient a
revelation in the ignorance of facts: by adducing the natural
antagonism between insular and continental nations, between Teutons
and Celts, between trading and agricultural peoples ; or the jealous
rivalry which is of course the normal condition of states which,
having no common object of ambition, are always in active com-
petition ; or any of the elaborately ingenious arguments which are
so apt to show that all things would have been exactly as they are
if everything had been diametrically opposite to what it was. All
this may be quite true ; it may be a fair experiment for the recon-
struction of the moral government of the world ; but it is not history,
and whatever the philosopher may do, the student may not pretend
to view matters from that high standing point at which facts and
individualities become invisible. As a matter of fact it was from
the Norman Conquest that England as a state was brought into
relation with the powers of Europe, and from its initial relations
with those powers, as the events of the twelfth century defined them,
that its political position was determined down to the period of the
1 Otto Prising, ftp. Urstis. i. 148.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGEK OF HOVEDEN 185

second French revolution. And this definition was owing, not to
antipathies or sympathies of races, not to physical geography, nor to
distinctions in the development of feudal institutions, but to the
varying personal relations of the rulers of the kingdoms, and to the
second nature of peoples educated for twenty generations in the wars,
and identifying themselves through good and evil with the interests,
and accumulating six centuries' experience of the rights and wrongs
of kings.

But although it was by the Conquest that England was forced Relations of
into the participation of European politics, it is to the complications aulf France
of the following century that the determination of her exact position £^1! ages
with regard to them is to be ascribed. There were during the
mediaeval period three distinct crises which defined the relations of
England with France, out of which most of her external history
resulted : the Conquest, the reign of Henry II., and the reign of
Edward III. Of these three the second is from this point of view the
most decisively important. The French and Norman quarrels might
indeed have produced the same results as did the marriage of Henry
and Eleanor, but their operation was merged in the larger questions
opened by the personal hatred between the Angevin princes and the
house of Lewis VII., and by the jealousies accumulated by the
transfer of Guienne and Poictou. The wars of Edward III. and They take
Henry V. would have been impossible without that training in the from the "r
hatred of foreigners which had been growing upon the English since Henry*!!,
the Conquest, but had reached its maximum during the internal and
external quarrels of the thirteenth century. Not that it was by any
means an indiscriminating hatred. England accepted the alien
Stephen rather than the alien Geoffrey ; and by the alien Simon de
Montfort wrought her deliverance from the tyranny based on and
aggravated by foreign favouritism. The king as a general rule was
accepted as the national leader, and, so long as his barons remained
foreigners in spirit, the heart of the nation was with him against
them. When the amalgamation between the barons and the people
was completed, and by a singular coincidence the king brought his The origin of
friends and ministers from abroad, it was time indeed to limit the feeling °'
power of the crown, but there was no thought of changing the p^ce3
dynasty; and the political alliances of the king, unlike mere
matrimonial ones, seem to have commanded the full sympathy of
the nation generally. To the English of the twelfth century, de-
livered by Henry II. from the feudal tyranny of the Norman baronage,
France was the great stay and support of the common enemies France the
of themselves and their king : to those of the thirteenth, from onsngUsh*
the accession at least of Henry III., France was the source and home antlilatliy
of men and measures which, as sustaining the royal faithlessness,

186

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

Balance of
power In
Europe In
the twelfth
centarv

Dirifdons of
Europe

No general
wars

were alike hateful to nobles and people : from the reign of
Edward III. downwards, king, nobles, and people joined heart and
soid in a war which lasted as long as the middle ages themselves.

The state of ' the balance of power in Europe,' in the twelfth
century, was this briefly : there were certain great bundles of states,
connected by a dynastic or by a national unity ; the kingdom of
France, the empire in Germany, the Christian states of Spain, the
territories of the house of Plantagenet, the still solid remnant of the
Byzantine empire, the well- compacted dominions of the Normans in
Apulia and Sicily. Of these, France, Germany, and Spain were
busily striving either for consolidation or against dissolution ; the
estates of the Plantagenets were bound only by the personal tie ;
Constantinople was far removed from the interests of Christendom,
her face set always eastward, in church and state ; the Norman state
in Sicily and Apulia was the best organised and most united kingdom,
and this, taken in conjunction with the wealth, splendour, ability,
and maritime superiority of the kings, gave it an importance much
greater than was due to its extent. All these great powers, with the
exception of the last, had their energies for the most part employed
on domestic struggles, and were prevented by the interposition of
small semi-neutral territories from any extensive or critical collision,
whilst much of their natural aggressive spirit was carried off to the
East Between the Normans and the de facto empire lay the
debatable and unmanageable estates of the papacy, and the bulwark
of Lombardy, itself a task for the whole imperial energies. Between
the same empire and France lay the remains of the ancient
Lotharingian and Burgundian kingdoms, from the North Sea to the
Mediterranean, hardly ever more than nominally imperial ; a region
destined to be the battlefield of many generations, as soon as the
rival nations should have consolidated themselves and girt up their
strength, but at present acting as a barrier over which it was useless
to fight, and far safer to shake hands. Between France and Spain,
neither of which had time for foreign war, lay the southern inherit-
ance of Eleanor and her vassals, whilst, although between Lewis VII.
and Henry II. there lay no such convenient welcome borderland,
there existed in France a class of vassals whose interest was at once
to keep the two kings asunder and to prevent either from over-
whelming the other. The welfare of Champagne and Flanders
depended on the balance of power between the two successive
husbands of Eleanor of Guienne.

By broad intervening barriers, and by constant occupation at
home, now in the humiliation of aspiring vassals, now in the struggle
for existence against the overwhelming power of the greater
feudatories, now in the maintenance of peace between rivals, the

THE CHRONICLE OF KOGKEK OF HOVEDEN 187

two great representatives of the resurrection of European life, the
kingdoms of France and Germany, were kept at arm's length from
each other, and, as being at arm's length, in an attitude something
like friendship. So for the most part they continued until the
consolidation of France by Lewis XI., and the great accumulation
of territory in the hands of Charles V., produced what is now the
recognised clue to modern politics, the balance of power properly so
called : the days when the borderlands became, instead of a
guarantee of peace, a battlefield of annual wars. The only real
question between them at this time was the papacy ; and it was not
yet time for a European war to be produced by the intrigues of rival
popes. The emperor found no sympathy in France for his claim French
to nominate or influence the election of a pontiff: France was regards the
always the open asylum of the exiled champions of ecclesiastical rtlayCyai
independence. But France was yet a long way from Italy, and her
assistance was given more readily in the applause of councils, and
in the material support of board, lodging, and preferment, than in
either armies , or embassies. Italy could fight her own battles, and
her innate life and passionate vigour was more than a match for
the strength of Germany removed far from home to a land of
strange air and unfamiliar food. Beyond Germany lay towards the
East a wide field for imperial energies, whether they took the line
of conquest or that of conversion. But the typical dominion of
Italy was an object far too dear, even to the wise head and the strong
heart of the great Frederick, to allow him to look elsewhere, until
the time came for the united effort of the Christian world to recover
Jerusalem, lost by their divisions and apathy.

Into such a Europe was England, or I should rather say the English Eleanor's
people under their foreign lord, introduced in the twelfth century, places
The Conquest had taught them what foreigners were ; the reign of cfos^neSgh-
Henry II. placed them in the closest relation to France, and through ^ttujhe1
it in a position to affect the rest of the continent. By the possession |Wef
of the insular kingdom the monarchs of the Norman house had powers
made at once the presence of a new influence felt. When Henry
had successfully vindicated his claims to the domains and superior-
ities united in Eleanor's inheritance., he found himself, in one part
or another of his estates in contact as close as was convenient with all
the great powers. Gascony brought him to the borders of Aragon,
and to the disputed frontier of Castile and Navarre. The homage His early
of Toulouse1 placed him in condition to affect the outlying pro-
vinces of the empire in the south, from which in the north he was
separated by the line, geographically and politically thin, of the
county of Flanders. Between north and south he bordered on a tories

1 Hoveden, ii. 45.

1SH

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

Hi* general
conduct
with regan]
to France

Henry's
French wars
f oufjh t by
mercenaries

land French by law and right, but quite willing to be debatable.
His earliest measures were taken to make this debatable land his
own. By marrying his son Henry to the daughter of Lewis VII., he
possessed himself of the Vexin, and left the French king with no
defensible line, in case of war, between Rouen and Paris ; by the
marriage of Geoffrey he obtained immediate possession of Brittany,
to which he had already a feudal claim, as to the Vexin he had
some show of an hereditary one ; ' by the betrothal of Richard to a
princess of Aragon,2 he seemed for a moment inclined to attempt
an intrusion into Spain, but it was really a momentary expedient
intended to affect the great claim to Toulouse, and when no longer
necessary was suffered to drop, preference being given to another
French match which would secure Bourges and Berry for the
future lord of Guienne and Poictou.

In these few circumstances we have the whole of the French policy
of Henry II. They point, if not to a high ambition, certainly not
to a mischievous one ; and they indicate a mind far more desirous
of peace than of war. By these measures, and by a policy of peace,
Henry managed to put himself in the right in all disputes with
Lewis VII. ; and during the early years of Philip II. he acted with
singular unselfishness as an arbiter in the quarrels of the French
vassals.3 In the former reign the difficulties always arose from the
interference of Lewis in the domestic affairs of his ex-wife ; and in
the latter Henry repaid good for evil, acting as a pacificator in dis-
putes which originated in the domestic jealousies of the maternal and
matrimonal connexions of the young king. In these transactions the
English did not often find themselves engaged hand to hand with
their French foes. The few campaigns in which battles were really
fought Henry carried on by mercenaries. It was rather by sympathy
with a sovereign who spared both the blood and money of his own
people,4 who utilised and consumed for the fighting of his battles the
objects of their most intense antipathy, that the English hatred of the
French originated and grew, until they met to fight side by side under
the walls of Acre. The policy of Henry in France was simply a family
policy — Angevin it may perhaps be called, but Angevin in two
senses, a bad one and a good one : bad in the inherited feature of
petty aggrandisement and unscrupulous chicanery, good in the point
that England's men and treasure were not exhausted in a great war
or in a large political struggle.

Had the state of Europe been other than what it was, his

1 Ord. Vit. vii. 14, x. 5. Oir.

Cum!.. De Inst. Pr. (ed. Brewer), p.
13.

2 Robert de Monte, ad 1159, ed.
Pistorius, i. 892.

1 Benedict, i. 277, 312.

4 Dhtlogus de Scaccario, p. 25.
' Miivult enim princeps stipendiaries
quam domesticos bellicis apponere
casibus.'

THE CHEONICLE OF ROGEK OF HOVEDEN 189

intensifying and unintermitting feud with France must have driven Henry.s
Henry II. to seek alliances with such of the great powers as might ^"^nc(
feel the same apprehensions from the same quarter. Spain, Germany, not im-

. , -,-, mediately

and Italy would be the natural resource in such circumstances. But connected

no two powerful states, as has been remarked already, felt them- other foreign

selves at this time in immediate contact or in immediate rivalry. r

Eleanor's inheritance had placed England nearer to France than any

other two states capable of independent policy yet lay to each other.

The rapprochement between Henry and the more distant powers was

brought about by other means, more especially by the struggle with The Becket

Thomas Becket, which from a mere personal quarrel became, owing to cau^o/oc-

the pertinacity of both parties, a topic of intense interest throughout ^^n^m

Europe. Henry's three daughters were married into Germany, Spain, alliai!Ces

and Italy ; in two at least out of three cases the alliance was suggested

by the political circumstances arising from this contest. In all

three we trace the beginning of a connexion which runs, with come

cha.nges of colour, but in an unbroken thread, throughout the middle

ages. These marriages, however, were not of Henry's seeking ; they

were the result of earnest application from the royal suitors,

and they were concluded after careful consideration of the eligibility

of the husband in the royal or national councils.1 It is as clear that

the goodwill of the nation was consulted in the case of the daughters,

as it is that neither its interests nor its wishes were regarded in the

case of the sons ; and thus that they were married as English, not

as Angevin princesses, and into countries where the English were well

pleased to place them. Although I should not venture to say that

these marriages afford a clue to anything like a comprehensive

foreign policy on Henry's part, they do mark the commencement of

close relations with European states which considerably affected

later combinations. I will take them briefly in order.

Germany had been since the year 1152, nominally at least, under
the sway of Frederick Barbarossa, who seemed at the beginning
of his reign to have united in a family alliance the Northern and Heury IL
Southern, the Saxon and Franconian interests, which had been in
their rivalry so pregnant of trouble to Henry IV., and which were
to divide the world in the parties of Guelf and Ghibelin. In the
strength of this union Frederick had set up his own pope, and kept strength ot
Alexander III. for some years in exile ; he had maintained a strong Barbara
hold on the Italian cities, and had curbed or intimidated into quiet-
ness the too rapidly degenerating Normans of Apulia. Frederick

' The marriage of Matilda with of Johanna with William the Good

Henry the Lion was the occasion of was the subject of a deliberation in

an aid pur fille maricr, as to which council : Hoveden, ii. 94 ; Benedict, i.

see Madox, Hist. Exch., p. 398. That 115, 117.

190

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

Connexion
of the Eng-
lish royal
family with
Germany

Henry I. and
Heury V.

Proposals for
Diarriages In

TIC*

Barbarossa inherited the blood of the emperor Charles the Great,
by the same stream that brought it into the veins of Henry Beau-
clerc and Henry Plantagenet. Judith, the widow of Tostig, son of
Godwin,1 had taken as her second husband duke Wolf of Bavaria,
the common ancestor of Frederick and his cousin and ally Henry
the Lion. Her sister Matilda was the wife of William the Conqueror.
The German connexion, begun by the children of Ethelred * and
Edmund, had been maintained by the marriage of Matilda the
daughter of Henry I., the heir ultimately of the line of Cedric, with
the emperor Henry V. Much English gold had flown thenceforth
into Germany. German princes visited and revisited the Norman
court ; an Austrian duke or margrave had perished in the White
Ship.3 The imperial hold on the Belgian provinces, which was
vindicated by Henry V.,4 brought the empire into close contact with
the coveted Flemish inheritance of his father-in-law. Henry I. had
the reputation of greatly influencing the policy of the later years of
Henry V. : on the emperor's death the imperial jewels found their
way into the English treasury ; it was not altogether impossible
that Henry V. intended the empire to go with them to either Matilda
or her father.5 The prompt action, however, of the Saxon party had
defeated the designs of both Matilda and the Franconian and
Swabian dukes. Lothar had subverted for the time the old imperial
policy, and the reign of Stephen had in England centred all men's
thoughts on their own safety.

It was apparently the similarity of circumstances and a craving
tor political sympathy and alliance in ecclesiastical difficulties that
Brought Henry II. and Frederick Barbarossa together. In 1165
Frederick found himself inextricably entangled with the pope, and saw
Henry in the same predicament with Becket, whom the pope was
warily and Lewis VII. enthusiastically supporting. It became an
object of importance with Frederick to obtain the adhesion of
England to the antipope. The emperor proposed two marriages ; 6

1 ' Accepit autem reginam Anglias
tune viduam, tiliam scilicet Balduini
nobilissimi comitis Flandriee, Judith-
am, in uxorem; ex qua duos filios,
Guelfonem et Heinricum, . . . pro-
genuit.' — Monachus Weingartensis, De
Gwelfis Principibus (scr. cir. 1188),
ap. Cards, Lectiones, vol. iii. p. 2, p.
582.

2 See the curious passage in Hove-
den's legal Appendix, R.8. vol. ii. 236,
where the protector of the etheling
Edward is called Malescoldus, rex
Dogorum. Other copies have Ru-
gorum, others Hunnorum, from which

perhaps our author freely trans-
lated, Dogorum quasi Hundorum.
Malescoldus's kingdom was also called
Russia. The passage is generally
explained of Stephen king of Hungary,
but it is surely very obscure. Is
there confusion with Godescalc, prince
of the Wends ? See Freeman, Norman
Conquest, i. 649.

1 Ord. Vit. xii. 26. He must have
been a son of Agnes of Swabia, by her
second husband, Leopold of Austria.

4 Otto Frising, ap. Urtisium, i. 148.

1 Hoveden, i. 181. Ord. Vit. xii. 43.

• R. de Monte, ed. Pist., i. 900.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN 191

asked two of Henry's daughters, one for his son, the other for his

cousin Henry the Lion. The proposal was favourably received by The English

the king, although his prime minister, the earl of Leicester, refused guvojre the

to hold any intercourse with the imperial ambassador, the archbishop

of Cologne,1 and the altars on which he had celebrated were thrown

down by the indignant clergy. Two English ministers attended the

diet of Wiirzburg, in which Alexander III. was renounced, whether

with or without their assent is uncertain.2 One of the royal mar- Marriage of

riages passed off ; the other, between Henry the Lion and Matilda, with Henry

was carried out three years later.3 The ecclesiastical importance of *

the negotiation turned out nil. If Henry ever really thought of

committing himself to the antipope, the thought was transient.

Far more probably he had determined by negotiation with the

enemy, to frighten the wavering pope into compliance with his

demands. His mother was still alive,4 and she had, if not experience,

at least warning in the case of her first husband of the danger of

dealing with antipopes.5 The time was not yet come for England and

Germany to take the same side heartily on such a question.

Henry the Lion, the husband of Matilda, is one of the most career of
interesting characters in mediaeval history, and in the period before uoay
OS is second in importance to Frederick alone. He was heir of the
imperial duchies of Bavaria and Saxony, which had been held by his
father, and from his mother he inherited, with the vast allodial estates of
the Billung dukes and the counts of Nordheim and Brunswick, the
right or claim as the representative of Saxon nationality to the
affection and obedience of the whole of the people of Lower Saxony.
He had family claims as descended from Azzo and Cunegunda to the
domains of the house of Este in Lombardy, and by expectancy, from
his uncle Welf of Tuscany, to the allodial estates of the great
countess Matilda. He had come to this vast inheritance as a child,
and, after the usual vicissitudes of a minority, had received from his
cousin full investiture of his German estates. His best years were
spent in the subjugation of the Wends and Slavs. His success in
consolidating and Christianising his conquests entitled him to the
character of a national hero, which he still possesses in North
Germany. A few years after his marriage he made a splendid Quarrel of
pilgrimage to Jerusalem, and on his return governed his vast estates LionTvith
in peace for three or four years. At the end of that time occurred the fc'

1 R. de Diceto, c. 539. Becket was i. 903.

of course opposed to this proposal, and 4 See a letter of Rotrou of Rouen to

made it the ground of the excom- cardinal Henry, S.T.C. iv. 148. She

munication of Richard of Ilchester; refused to see the German embassy.

Ep. 5; S. T. C. iii. 12. 5 Albert, 1102. Silvester IV. 1105-

2 See Robertson's Becket,p. 176. 1111.

3 R. de Monte, ad 1168, ed. Pistorius.

192

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

HU l.nth

Ohaiacter of
Henry IL's
policy In
Germany

Otto IV.

William of

quarrel with the emperor, which resulted from the defeat of Legnano.
It is not now the time to attempt to unravel that mysterious busi-
ness ; all that is certain is that Frederick attributed his defeat to
Henry's lukewarm support, and in consequence determined on his
downfall. Summoned before an imperial court, scorning or fearing
to obey the summons, by one sentence the lord of half of Germany
found himself a landless* man. His wife's dower alone was spared
out of respect to her father. The unhappy couple took refuge in
Normandy and England, and there their children were born and
brought up as English princes. After four years' exile Henry was
restored to his Brunswick estates on the intercession of his father-
in-law; but in 1188 he was again banished, and was only permitted
to return after the death of Frederick. He died in 1195, and lies
with his faithful wife in his great church in Brunswick, hard by
the ancient picture of the Martyrdom of 8. Thomas, whose contro-
versies had brought them together.1

On a connexion like this it may seem crotchety or pedantic to
lay much weight; but it points, to say the least, to matters of
considerable importance. It illustrates forcibly the characteristic
policy of Henry II., to interfere in foreign matters, even those most
closely connected with the interests of his own family, only so far
as he saw thaiThis interference was likely to be effective. He spent
his money liberally, he sent ambassadors, he stirred up all his
political interest with France, Flanders, and Borne to obtain his son-
in-law's restoration ; but he did not go to war : nay, he admitted a
proposal for the marriage of his son Richard with a daughter of
the emperor.3 But further, the connexion itself was very fruitful
of effects. One of the sons of Henry the Lion and Matilda, in
England earl of York,3 in France invested with the county of Poictou,4
the inheritance of his grandmother, in Scotland regarded as the
probable heir of William the Lion,5 and the not impossible suc-
cessor of Richard himself,6 achieved by his uncle's aid a higher
destiny still, and became emperor as Otto IV. Another son, William
of Winchester, carried on the line of Brunswick • princes, which after

1 The monks of Canterbury appealed
to Henry and Matilda, by their regard
to the martyr, to intercede for them
with the king in 1188. Epp. Cant.
158.

Benedict, i. 319, 322.

Hoveden, ad ann. 1190 (f. 890).

Hoveden, ad ann. 1190 (f. 890 V).

Hoveden, ad ann. 1195 (f. 430),
and ad 1196 (fo. 432, Savile).

Hoveden, 449 (Savile).

Henry the Wonderful, duke of

Brunswick, writes to Edward I. as his
cousin in 1280 ; and his mother, Adel-
heid of Montferrat, cousin of Edward
on the mother's side, consults him as
to the guardianship of her children.
Fcedera, i. 580, 581. Relationship
wan probably forgotten before 1352,
when John, king of France, arbitrated
on a challenge to single combat, sent
by Otto of Brunswick to Henry duke
of Lancaster.— Leibnitz, Scr. Rer.
Bruns. ii. pref. 8-10.

THE CHEONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN ' 193

the lapse of five centuries slid into the throne of the Plantagenets.
But the chief point of interest lies in the fact that the connexion
with Germany continued to subsist throughout the succeeding
centuries as a national rather than a merely dynastic one. England
was successively the ally of Otto IV. the Welf, of Frederick II. the
Ghibelin, and of the papal or Welfic party which achieved his down-
fall. From England came king Kichard of Almain ; and in Rudolf of
England Rudolf of Hapsburg sought a bride for his son Hartmann.
Adolf of Nassau, king of the Romans, fought against France as a
mercenary of Edward I. Edward III. was brother-in-law of Lewis
of Bavaria, his successor was son-in-law of Charles IV.1 No sooner Relations of
was the title of each successive house to the empire established, than k£«s with
the English alliance was sought as the complement of imperial Uerma"y
authority. The house of Lancaster acted cordially with the house
of Luxemburg. Henry IV. had fought with the German Crusaders ;
his brother, cardinal Beaufort, waged war on the Hussites. Henry
V. and Henry VI. supported the plans of Sigismund at Constance
and Basel. During the schism the German pope was the English
pope. English Wycliffe gave the colour to German Protestantism.
Until the male line of Plantagenet ended, and the Burgundian
inheritance falling to the imperial house added the Burgundian to
the imperial traditions of alliance, and at the same time changed the
face of Europe : from the Reformation to the year 1830, if not to
1854, this traditionary alliance was still one of those forces of modern
Europe whose workings constitute modern history.

The precise transaction which placed Henry II. in direct political Relations
contact with Italy was, as in the case of Germany, the Becket begin from
quarrel.2 In the year 1169 he offered the cities of the Lombard quarrel
league a large sum of money for their fortifications, and proposed a
marriage with one of his daughters to the young king of Sicily, if
they would use their influence with the pope to procure the deposi-
tion or translation of the archbishop.3 Italian affairs had, however,

1 I only mention here the imperial combined to make Charles IV. and

alliances. The Feeder a contain a vast Richard II. support the pope of Rome

number of treaties with the several against the pope of Avignon, in the

princes. The importance of these great schism. A great deal, religiously

transactions should not be exagger- as well as politically important, re-

ated ; for, continuous as they are, the suited from this accident,

advantages derived from the alliances '* Spicilegium Liberianum, p. 548,

seem to be exclusively on the side of S.T.C. iii. 122.

the Germans. Although the connexion 3 Baronius ad ann. 1169. ' Confu-
was national, there was not much love git ad Italia? civitates promittens
lost between the nations. I am in- Mediolanensibus 3000 marcarum ad
clined to place the restoration of a murorum suorum validissimam re-
cordial feeling between Germany and parationem, ut cum aliis civitatibus
England as late as the fourteenth quas corrumpere moliebatur, impet.ra-
century, when different circumstances rent a papa et ccclesia Romana

194

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

Alliance
between
William the
Good and
Heury n

long before this been an object of interest in England. The Norman
conquest of Apulia occupied a place in the common histories hardly
less important than the Crusades ; many Englishmen, such as
Robert of Salisbury, the chancellor of Sicily,1 Herbert of Middlesex,
the bishop of Cosenza,2 and Richard archbishop of Syracuse,3 had
sought and obtained high preferment in the south. English
physicians studied like Athelard 4 at Salerno, English canonists like
S. Thomas himself at Bologna.8 Rome had been a kind Alma
Mater to Nicolas Breakspear and Robert Pullanus.6 From North
Italy had come to England Lanfranc and the two Anselms ; from
the court of king Roger, Thomas le Brun, the minister of the
English exchequer.7 Peter of Blois was the intimate friend of both
Henry II. and William the Good. The constant missions to and
from Rome had made Italians and Englishmen pretty well ac-
quainted. Henry's political exigencies, however, brought them still
nearer. William the Good was connected by blood very closely with
the Beaumonts of Leicester and Warwick, a family which supplied
Henry II. with several ministers in his early years. Many of his
principal clergy were Englishmen or Normans, and he seems to have
been an enthusiastic admirer of Henry II. What action was taken
in consequence of Henry's proposition to him is not known :
probably none ; but we find him in 1178 writing to console the
king on the rebellion of his sons, and, as soon as the princess
Johanna was old enough to be asked for, petitioning for her as a
wife.8 The proposal was referred to the national council, and

dejectionem vcl Iran slut ion cm Can-
tuariensis archiepiscopi. Nam ob
eandera causam Cremonensibus duo
millia marcarum promiserat, Papien-
sibus mille, et totidem Bononiensibus
... At quod per se impetrare non
poterat, regis Siculi viribus conatus
est extorquere. Sed nee ille licet ad
hoc toto nisu Syracusanus episcopus
. . " — From a letter addressed to
'Alexander III.

1 John of Hexham, ap. Twysden,
275. He was chancellor to king Roger
in 1147.

2 R. de Diceto, 628.

* Richard Palmer, bp. of Syracuse,
elect. 1155, a candidate for the see of
Lincoln, 8 T.C. iii. 123; translated
to Messina, in 1183, Greev. Sicil. ii.
293, 613. He entertained 8. Thomas's
relations in exile: S.T.C. iii. 319,
320. Walter, archbishop of Palermo,
1169-1187: R. de Diceto. His
brother Bartholomew succeeded him :
GrsBv. Sicil. ii. 77. He wasbp. of Agri-

gentum, 1172-1187.

4 Wright, Biogr. Lit. ii. 95.

4 W. FitzStephen, S.T.C. i. 185.

• Chancellor of the Apostolic see
under Lucius II. and Eugenius III. ;
he was a cardinal priest, but of what
title I cannot find. J. Hexham, 275 ;
Jaffe, Rcgesta Pontificum, pp. 609,
616.

7 Dialogns de Scaccario, p. 17.

• See vol. ii. in Rolls Series, p. 94,
note 2. In that note I have argued
a little rashly, from the words of
William's letter to Henry, Fcedera,
i. 32, that the renewal of the pro-
position came from Henry. The date
of the letter is too late to show
this. It appears from Benedict and
Hoveden that the Sicilian ambas-
sadors came to England about April
1176; they received the oath taken
for Henry by three of his counsellors,
for the marriage, and reported to their
master that the king of England
demanded his oath in return. His

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN 195

accepted. Johanna was sent to Palermo, and received a magnificent
dower.1 In that splendid court she reigned supreme during her
husband's life. His fleet covered the Levant, and although the loss
of Jerusalem was sometimes laid to his charge in consequence of his
disabling the Byzantine empire from action, the last two years of his
life were devoted to the equipment of the Crusade. As his health failed William
he made a will, by which he left to Henry not only all the provisions stores to
collected for the expedition,2 but a vast treasure besides, going more-
over so far as to offer the succession to his crown to him or one of his
sons.3 This proposal Henry wisely declined, as he did also the story of
thorny crown of Palestine. His moderation was hardly appreciated Italian"
by his contemporaries, whose idea of his ambition transcended all
probability. This close connexion with William the Good, coupled
with Henry's attempt to marry John to the heiress of Savoy, a
measure which would have put the Alpine passes at his disposal,
and some rumour of his promises to the Lombard league, perhaps
formed the basis of the story that, looking at the unsettled condition
of Italy, he was disposed to become a candidate for the suffrages of
the Roman citizens with a view to the empire.* /i •*,»_'

More substantial results than this followed. The dowry of Results of
Johanna was the ground, first of the quarrel and then of the alliance marriage
of Richard I. with Tancred, an alliance that was to be cemented by
the marriage of Arthur as heir of England with a daughter of the
Sicilian king. This agreement led to the captivity of Richard, and
subsequently to his alliance with Henry VI., an alliance broken
indeed by the events of the next reign, but bearing fruit in time in the
English marriage of Frederick' II., and in the repeated offer of the
Sicilian kingdom to Henry III., an event which, however unimpor-
tant as regards Italy, was fraught with abundant interest to English
constitutional history. It is unnecessary to mention the later English
acts of England in North and South Italy, matters certainly of anti- rich \\\ '
quarian and minor historical interest, but — with a few insignificant history

letter to Henry is to excuse himself imperatorem Fredericum et suos

from taking the oath personally, as obortse, tarn ab Italia quam urbe

beneath his royal dignity ; it is to be Romulea ssepius invitatus ; com para ta

taken by proxy. This is dated Pa- quidem sibi ad hoc Morianse vallis et

lermo, August 23. Before receiving it Alpium via, sed non efficaciter ob-

Henry's preparations were made for tenta.' If we may judge from the

Johanna's journey (Benedict, i. 119), particulars preserved by Ealph de

on the 15th of August. Diceto, English sympathy was rather

1 Benedict, i. 116. on the side of the Italian cities, c.

2 Benedict, ii. 132. 584, 585, 590, 591. I fear that

3 Pet. Blesens., ep. cxiii. (ed. Bu- nothing can be pleaded but necessity
seeus), p. 204. in favour of Henry, who at the same

4 Giraldus Cambrensis, De Instr. tune was allying himself with Frede-
Pr. ii. 1, p. 13, ' verum etiam ad rick and contributing to the fortifica-
Romanum imperium, occasione werrse tion of the Lombard cities against
diutinse et inexorabilis discordise inter him.

o2

196

THE CHRONICLE OF ROOEK OF HOVEDEN

English
Interest in
Spain begins
through the
Normans

Normans In
Spain

Conquest of
Portugal

exceptions, as regards political history, of little serious import
— secondary in all respects and subsidiary to the more prominent
personal interests of the empire and France. It is enough to say
that from the time of Frederick Barbarossa to that of the Visconti
and the Sforze, Italian politics are faithfully reported in English
chronicles, sometimes with more precision and with more verisimili-
tude than in their own ; a fact that shows the existence of constant
private as well as public intercourse.

With Spain the English as English had little or no connexion.
Before the Conquest I do not find record of even a pilgrimage to
Compostella. The national intercourse began under the Normans,
was greatly increased by the Crusades, and when the inheritance of
Eleanor had made the territories of the ruling houses conterminous,
ripened into a friendship which lasted until the Reformation. Spain
was the earliest, as it was the latest and the most prosperous, battle-
ground for those crusading energies which were so natural to the
Norman spirit of adventure. Roger de Toeny, the standard-bearer
of Normandy, had won his laurels there while duke William was
still a baby, and had taught the sagacious Castilians the value of
Norman swords. Alfonso the Valiant had petitioned for the hand
of a daughter of the Conqueror. Count Rotrou of Perche and
Robert Burdet had been the heroes of the war which finally delivered
Aragon from the infidels.1 Norman as well as French and Bur-
gundian valour had helped to found the kingdom of Portugal.
Norman piety found and Norman valour kept up the route of pil-
grimage to St. James. By the time of Stephen English sympathies
were enlisted on the side of the Christian powers. The coast of
Portugal lay most convenient for the crusading fleets ; there the
ships might take in water and horses, the crews stretch their
cramped limbs, and the warriors flesh their maiden swords on
infidels by way of prelude to the great battle. So the English in
conjunction with the Flemings had taken Lisbon in the second
crusade ; 2 the English strictly so called, without a single great
Norman baron among them : the East Anglians under Hervey
Glanville, the Kentish men under Simon of Canterbury, the
Londoners under Andrew of London, the Hampshire and Hastings
men under William Calf. Gilbert of Hastings, an Englishman, was
the first bishop of Lisbon. This was done when Stephen and the
Norman nobles had not a finger to raise but in their own quarrel?.
What was then done was the first link in a chain that bound
Portugal to England ; and it was followed up by the similar capture

1 See Orderic. Vit. xiii. 8, 4; for
the exploits of Robert Burdet, xiii. 5,
6, Ac. ; and the history of Spain

generally, xiii. 1-10.

1 Itin. R Ricardi, pref., pp. cxliv-
olxxxii (Rolls Series).

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN 197

of Silvia in the year 1188,1 a conquest which very nearly completed
the coast-line of the existing kingdom. In the north of Spain, how-
ever, the more immediate interest lies. As early as 1158, Henry II., Marriage of
as we have seen,2 negotiated a marriage for his infant son Richard Alfonso an
with a daughter of queen Petronilla of Aragon ; in 1170 he married
his daughter Eleanor to Alfonso III. of Castile. This latter alliance
produced a close intercourse. In 1177 Henry was chosen to arbi-
trate between the kings of Navarre and Castile, gave audience in a
public council of his barons,3 consulted them as to the verdict, and
in their name and his own pronounced the decision. Spanish
bishops took part in the services of the English church. Compo- intercourse
stella became a favourite .place of pilgrimage. Thither Henry EngS and
himself proposed to go ; 4 Henry the younger offered to do the same Spair
in atonement for his rebellion ; 5 Henry the Lion actually visited
the famous shrine during his exile.6 It was on his way from Compo-
stella that earl Patrick of Salisbury was slain by Guy of Lusignan,7
a sin which caused the banishment of the latter, and tended in no
remote way to the loss of Palestine. The vicissitudes of Moorish
warfare during this period are carefully recorded by English
historians.8 Was it altogether impossible that the king might
fulfil his vow as a crusader, and find a fit field for his ambition, in
the recovery of Spain for the Christians ? From the same associa- Marriage of
tion sprang the marriage of Richard I. with Berengaria ; but we Bereugana :
cannot afford now to trace the line of connexion in detail. Let it
suffice to point out the results of the first Spanish marriage, in the
claims of Lewis VIII. of France on the kingdom of John ; in the
relations of Edward I. to Alfonso the Wise, from whom he received Edward i.

i .f ., . ... , . . , ., , -. ., . . and Eleanor:

an exemplary wife, the gift of knighthood, and the curious resigna-
tion of the duchy of Gascony, which it was said had been given by
Henry II. to his daughter Eleanor.9 By this second match
Ponthieu came to the English crown, and gave Edward III. in his
turn a foothold in France ; whilst the marriages of his sons, the dukes John of
of Lancaster and York, together with the warlike spirit of the Black Edwarl of
Prince, involved the kingdom in the complications of Spanish warfare, Lailgley :
and made Edward the ancestor of the emperor Charles V. In the
particulars of all these transactions there are opened to us details of Possible
great personal and antiquarian interest. The connexion of the De the mter-
Montforts with Aragon is another point of importance, which bears England* ana
more remotely on the present subject, and yet may have exercised Spam

1 See Roll Series, vol. ii. p. Iviii. 6 Benedict, i. 288.

2 P. 188. •> R. de Monte, ad 1168. Hoveden,

3 Benedict, i. 139. Hoveden, ii. i. 273. Gervase, 1403.

120. s E.g. R. de Diceto, 623, 624.

4 Benedict, i. 157. 9 Fcedera, i. 310.

5 Ibid. i. 114.

198

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

Interest of
these pnr-
ttooltn

Actual
result* from
these gmall
causes

some considerable influence on the growth of the English constitu-
tion ; but it may be we are not yet in possession of materials that
may enable us to determine the amount of credit to be ascribed to
Simon and to Edward respectively, or, through their education, to
Aragon and Castile ; to determine in what measure and through
what line of events we can connect the Great Charter of England
with the Great Privilege of Aragon, or the summoning of borough
representatives in England with the like usage across the Pyrenees.
Whatever we may think of the sagacity of the great prince from
whose designs so important results followed, and however much we
may be inclined to see in these details but the occasions for com-
binations which must have taken place in the natural course of
things, it is by no means the least interesting part of the work of
the historical student to trace the connexion of the facts, and to
group them in such a way as may display them, if not as the con-
scious work of politic heads, at least as the strivings of a family of
nations after a social organisation : the attempts of the individual
peoples to realise their personal identity, if I may so speak, in the
exercise of national memory, national affections, national intimacy
with each other. I trust that I have pointed out, however sketchily,
the way in which England, under dynastic influences, did this. To
show how those dynastic influences leavened the nation with kindred
sentiment would be a longer and far more difficult task : it might
be done ; it would be interesting ; but as we already know the result,
the process of investigation would be less important. We do know
that England stood on terms of close friendship with the empire,
and through it with Spam and Italy, and in immemorial enmity
with France, when the Reformation introduced a new element of
political life, and at the same time the balance of power in Europe
became the leading idea in politics. Nay, we see how, notwithstand-
ing the differences of religion and throughout the reign of the
political idea, England retained for the most part her old affinities : *
how, in spite of the Spanish armada, Charles I. sought a bride in
Spain ; how, in spite of the Palatinate marriage, England abstained
from taking an active part in the thirty years' war ; and how in
spite of all that might have drawn England and France together,
for the space of six hundred years, from the siege of Acre and the

1 In the history of the seventeenth
century as in that of the thirteenth,
the dynastic policy of the king may
have differed, sometimes widely, from
the political wishes of the people so
far as they had any. The Spanish
match was an idea of the king; the
people would have gone to war for the

Palatine ; the French under Henry IV.
were probably more popular in Eng-
land than ever before or afterwards.
But the older feeling was revived and
more than justified by the events that
followed the Restoration ; and the end
of the century saw the old combinations
stronger than ever.

199

battle of Arsouf to the .siege of Sebastopol and the battles of the
Crimea, English and French armies never met except as enemies.

To descend again to particulars. The books on which we are These things
here employed were written by men living in the court, and in daily
intercourse with the kings from whose designs such long-continued
effects have flowed. In the preceding sketch I have drawn only the evidences
greater and more important outlines, those which have political
connexion and historical consequences. More antiquarian research
would, I am aware, reveal equally interesting, though less significant,
series of details in other relations besides those to France, Italy,
Germany, and Spain. Palestine, Constantinople, Norway, the Moors
of Spain and Africa, all contribute their quota of incidents to the
annals, and their documents to the illustration of the politics of the
period. The extreme value of the contemporary histories of this
reign is shown by this among other proofs, that in one or other of
them is contained every important document, on every important
transaction, national, dynastic, political, or diplomatic, that has been
preserved at all. There are few such records in existence older than
the date of the manuscripts of the historians, and of those few hardly
one that is not enrolled by them in their most precious storehouses,
attesting by its faithfulness to the original the conscientious
tonesty as well as the unwearied industry of their way of working.

•200

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF I1OVEDEN

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF
HOVEDEN. VOL. III.

[The Preface to this volume deals with sundry events in liichard I.'s
reign from 1189 to 1196 ; Richard's policy on his accession is described,
and the history of Longchamp's administration receives careful treat-
ment. The characters and policy of Hugh de Puiset, of Hugh of
Nunant, and of Geoffrey Plantagenet are also sketched. But the main
interest of this Preface centres round Longchamp, of whose fall a foil
account is given.]

Sketch of
the early
history of
Richard I. 'a
reign

His personal
interest In
England

Early educa-
tion of
Henry's BOIM

Provincial

Influence on
their ch«-

ract- r-

THE interest of the internal history of Richard's reign is only
very slightly indebted to the personal action of the king. His
influence is felt only as a remote and varying pressure, affecting the
amount and impact of taxation, the placing and displacing o'
ministers. The island kingdom, irrespective of its function as
supplying revenue, lies very much out of the sphere of his political
plans, and owes nothing to any paternal care or special exercise rf
sagacity on its behalf. He originated no reforms ; he did not even
interest himself in such things so far as to reverse the measures of
his father. He had no policy of government, and for his policy of
aggression England satisfied him by contributing money.

Henry's early idea of dividing his dominions among his sots
had this among other indirect effects : Henry, Richard, and Geoffrey
were exposed to all the temptations of a sovereign position without
the absolute liberty of action which would have left them free to
find work for themselves. Whilst other princes of their age were
learning experience and sowing wild oats in the Crusades, they were
exercising substantial power as the colleagues or vassals of their
father in England, Normandy, Aquitaine, and Brittany. Their
education, such as it was, was carried on amidst the people whoii
they were to govern, and, as is usual in such cases, their characters
were formed by the moral and political tone of their provincial
courts. Henry became the ally, the hero and the victim of the feudal
party in England and Normandy ; Geoffrey developed the Angevinity
— the dishonesty, turbulence, and general want of principle — which

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

201

Kioliard's
birth,
nurture,
and early
prospects

marked his grandfather's line ; Richard, the faults and the brilliancy
of the Poictevin. Throughout his life he is amenable in a remarkable
way to the personal authority and national influences of his mother.
Eichard was born in England,1 and nursed by an Englishwoman ; 2
but there his personal interest in England seems to determine. At
a very early age he was marked out as the heir of Eleanor.3 When
he was two years old his father planned for him a marriage with the
daughter of the queen of Aragon, one of the terms of which was
the settlement of the duchy of Aquitaine on the infant couple.4 In
1165 his mother brought him from England into Normandy.5 At
Epiphany 1169 he did homage to Lewis VII. for the duchy of
Aquitaine ; 6 the following year he received it as his share of his
father's dominions, when, in the expectation of death, Henry, at He becomes
Mote de Ger, divided them among his elder sons.7 In 1171 he Aquitaine
joined with his mother in laying the foundation of the church of
S. Augustine at Limoges.8 On Trinity Sunday the same year he
was installed as duke in the abbatial seat of S. Hilary at Poictiers,
receiving the lance and banner from the bishop John of Poictiers
and the archbishop of Bordeaux, and having the hymn, ' 0 princeps
egregie,' sung in procession. The same year he was invested at
Limoges with the ring of S. Valeria, the protomartyr of the Gauls ; 9

1 His birth at Oxford is asserted by
Ealph de Diceto, c. 531. The event is
placed at Windsor by the author of the
chronicle quoted in the next note, but
Oxford is more likely. Windsor might
easily be substituted for Oxford by one
ignorant of the circumstances ; not so
Oxford for Windsor. The month
September, 1157, is mentioned by
Robert de Monte, 890 (ed. Struve),
and the day ' Sexto Idus Septembris '
is given in the Chronicon Andegavense
published by Labbe, Bibliotheca MSS.
i. 276, from a MS. of the monastery
of S. Albinus at Angers.

2 ' Mense Septeinbri natus est anno
MCiwVii0, regi filius Ricardus nomine
apud Windleshore ; eadem nocte natus
est Alexander Nechani apud Sanctum
Albanum ; cujus mater fovit Ricardum
ex mamilla dextra, sed Alexandrum
fovit ex mamilla sua sinistra.' MS.
in the Lord Arundel's collection,
quoted by James in his collections
now in the Bodleian, vol. vii. 34. The
name of Richard's nurse, whether she
was Alexander Neckham's mother or
no, was Hodierna. She had an estate
in land of seven pounds a year at
Chippenham, and the parish of Knoyle
Hodierne in Wiltshire still preserves

her name. Rot. Glaus. Hen. III. (ed.
Hardy) i. 416. This could not have
been the whole of her property, for
her land in 30 Hen. III. was talliaged
at 40s.

3 Gir. Camb. De Inst. Pr. lib. iii. c. 8.

4 Rob. de Monte (ed. Struve), 892.

5 Ibid. 900. 6 Ibid. 905.

7 Ben. Pet. i. 7.

8 Geoff. Vigeois, Labbe, Bibl. MSS.
ii. 318 : ' Monasterium Sancti Augus-
tini Lemovicis inceptum est construi.
Tempore illo Regina Alienor cum filio
Ricardo Lemovicre forte cum esset,
lapides infundamento primosjecerunt.'

" Geoff. Vigeois, Labbe, ii. 318 :
' Tempore illo rex Henricus senior filio
Ricardo ex voluntate matris Aquita-
norum tradidit ducatum. Post hsec
apud Sanctum Hilarium Pictavis
Dominica post Pentecosten, juxta
consuetudinem, in abbatis sedem ele-
vatur, sed a Bertramo Burdegalensi et
Johanne Pictavensi prsesulibus kncea
ei cum vexillo prrebetur, et ad proces-
sionem cantatur O princeps egregie
. . . Procedenti tempore Ricardus
Lemovicas veniens in urbe cum pro-
cessione suscipitur, annulo Sanctse
Valeria decoratur, novusque dux ab
omnibus proclamatur.'

202 THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

and in 1178 he received the homage of the count of Toulouse, being
then sixteen.1

HU w»r» By that unhappy fate which attended his family, he fought his

uther first campaign as duke of Aquitaine, against his father, under the

influence of his mother and her advisers Ralph de Fai and Lewis VII.*

From the time of the pacification Richard, unlike his elder brother,

recovered his hold on his share of the inheritance, and from his

eighteenth year administered Aquitaine with very slight control from

Richard's his father.3 In the apparently conflicting statements of Giraldus

government . . , , . . .

of Aquitaine that during this period he showed great powers of organisation,
f "the *s life reducing the disorderly nobles to subjection, extending the boundaries
and improving the laws of his states ; 4 and those of Benedict and
Thomas Agnellus,8 that he governed capriciously and tyrannically,
that he was ' malus omnibus, suis pejor, pessimus sibi,' 6 we trace an
element of agreement. His policy was, like his father's, directed to
the humiliation of the barons who had enjoyed under the weak and
luxurious princes who preceded Eleanor an almost unbridled licence,
and to the creation of a really independent sovereignty. The
complaints of his treatment of the wives and daughters of the
nobles show, if they were true, that he followed in other respects
the traditions of his mother's house too faithfully. By the barons
of Aquitaine the younger Henry, who had been the stalking-horse
of the baronage in Normandy and England, was called in against
Richard. His death opened the way for his brother to higher
honours, but Richard's relations with the great vassals of the duchy
were throughout his life the same ; and the stand which during his
father's life he made against them without help from abroad
abundantly vindicates his character for perseverance and military
skill. The lords of Saintonge, the counts of Angouleme, the
viscounts of Limoges,7 with a wide network of alliances among

1 Ben. Pet. i. 86. Geoff. Vig. (ap. reducens, fortia confundens et aspera

Labbe, ii. 319) gives the day Feb. 25. complanans, antiques Aquitanin ter-

* Ben. Pet. i. 42. minos et jura refonuavit.'

• In 1175, Ben. Pet. i. 81. Ralph * See the passage quoted in thepre-
de Diceto places the date of his crea- face to Hoveden, R. S. vol. ii. p. Ivii.
tion as duke of Aquitaine in his 23rd • Ben. Pet. i. 292.

year, 1179 (R. Die. 675); but he was in r Richard's enemies are the same

active employment there long before. throughout his career. They are

4 De Inst. Pr. iii. 8: 'Terram enumerated by Benedict, i. 115, and

hactenus indomitam in tenera estate much of their history may be learned

tanta virtute rexit et domuit, ut non from Geoffrey of Vigeois. The barons

tantum ipsamperomnesejusanfractus of Poictou seem to have had an

longe plenius et tranquillius solito admitted right of making private war ;

pacificaret, verum etiam mutilata du- at least Richard on one occasion

dum et dispersa reintegrans, strenua alleged it to Philip as an excuse for

virtute pristinos in status singula not using compulsion with them

revocaret. In formam igitur informia (Hoveden, iii. 255) ; but this must be

redigens, in normam enormia queeque distinguished from the constant trouble

THE CHKONICLE OF ROGEK OF HOVEDEN 203

the almost inaccessible lordships of the Pyrenees, afforded him work

and discipline enough, not to speak of the claims on Auvergne and

Toulouse, which could, if enforced, have brought only an empty

homage. Two short visits, one in HTG/and another in 1184,2seem

to be the sum of his opportunities for making acquaintance with only twice

England, during the twenty years that preceded his accession to the accession

crown.

Untrained to English ways, and exempt for the most part from He attempts
the influence of English factions, Eichard must have seen that his
best policy was to leave the kingdom alone, to be governed on his
father's principles, and to develop resources which might enrich
him without giving him trouble. But he must have underrated the
personal influence of his father if he trusted that the institutions
which he had created would act by themselves, or answer to the
handling of new, inexperienced workmen. Henry's influence had
been felt directly everywhere, and his servants had been educated
under him, or had grown with him into the knowledge of their work.
Eichard's first attempt was to manage by new men a system which
was far from maturity, and would not bear rough or indiscriminate
usage. The elements which had supplied Henry's early difficulties
survived, although weakened and disarmed. Much of the influence
which his great ministers exercised over the baronage was personal
quite as much as official. It might be a question whether, after his
guiding hand was removed, the old administrators could have
successfully maintained their position and his policy. Eichard's His system
initial measures, and the results which followed them during the
years which he spent on crusade and in captivity, were such as to
try very cruelly the fabric which his father had raised.

The English history of the reign is, then, the history not of The history
Eichard, but of his ministers ; of the administrations of his four °s r
successive justiciars, William Longchamp,3 Walter of Coutances,
Hubert Walter, and Geoffrey FitzPeter. The importance of the

which the males consuetudines of the New Year's Day 1185. Ben. Pet. i. 319,

Pyrenean counts and barons gave him, 333, 334. [Eichard paid Henry II. a

who were really patrons of banditti short visit in England soon after Whit-

who lived on the plunder of pilgrims suntide 1179.]

to Compostella. See Ben. Pet. i. 132 ; 3 William Longchamp was chief

Bic. Devizes, p. 12 ; Hoveden, iii. 35, justiciar either solely or with col-

36. leagues from Dec. 11, the day of

1 In 1176 he landed on Good Fri- Bichard's departure, to October 10,
day at Southampton, spent Easter at 1191, when he was compelled to vacate
Winchester, and almost immediately the post. Walter of Coutances held
returned to Poictou. Ben. Pet, i. 115, the office from Oct. 10, 1191, to the
120. time of his departure to Germany in

2 In 1184 he came to England in January 1194; Hubert Walter from
November, stayed over Christmas. January 1194 to July 31, 1198 ;
which he spent at Windsor with the Geoffrey FitzPeter from that time to
king, and sailed from Dover before his death in 1213.

204

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

His impru-
dent choice
of ministers,
and pro-
vision for
John and
O«offrey

Richard's
treatment of
lii? father's
friends and

enemies

He exacts
money from
the former,

and punishes
the latter

first two of these is of a political, that of the latter of a constitutional
character. But the survey of a period which, coming between
Henry II. and John, must necessarily have witnessed a great growth
of national life, and which contains other elements of interest which
have engrossed the attention of contemporaneous and later historians,
to the exclusion of the less romantic topics, deserves examination in
detail.

The seeds of the difficulties of the first three years of the reign
were sown by Richard himself during the few months that followed
his coronation, in the choice of the ministers who were to govern
England during the crusade, and in the measures taken for securing
the good behaviour of John and Geoffrey. In neither of these
respects can Richard be charged with any greater fault than political
short-sightedness. The events that illustrate them begin from the
very moment of his father's funeral.

No sooner was the body of Henry consigned to the tomb at
Fontevraud than the question arose how were the new and old
relations of his successor to be reconciled ; how was he to treat those
who had been faithful to his father on principles which would make
them not less faithful to himself, and how to reward those who had
been his friends on principles which would from the moment of his
succession make them his enemies. First and foremost of these
classes came his brothers, the faithful Geoffrey and the faithless
John ; after them the whole roll of the baronage ; on the one side,
Ranulf Glanvill and Stephen of Turnham, with the rest of Henry's
servants ; on the other, Ralph of Fougeres, Juell of Mayenne,1 and
the rest who had deserted the father to make capital in the service
of the son. Richard's first thought was to revenge himself on his
father's friends ; but it was a short-lived idea, and gave way so soon
to better feelings that the two on whom the first brunt of his hasty
anger fell seem to have become, as soon as their punishment was
over, his most faithful friends.2 Stephen Turnham3 and Ranulf
Glanvill 4 were compelled to purchase his goodwill by heavy fines ;
but those paid, the former was restored to his post as steward of
Anjou, and Glanvill, although he was not suffered to retain the
justiciarship, attended the court as a counsellor until his departure
for the crusade, on which he died. Towards those who had deserted
Henry in his last difficulties, Richard adopted different conduct:
dispossessed them of their estates, and treated them as his own
enemies. The lords of Fougeres and Mayenne continued during his

' Ben. Pet ii. 72.

* See Ben. Pet. ii. 76.

* Bic. Devizes, pp. 5-8. See also
Ben. Pet. ii. 71, 72, where the king is
said to have broken off the marriage

of Stephen's son on account of the in-
feriority of his birth. The question
of Stephen's identity is, however, still
unsettled.

4 Ric. Deviz. pp. 6-8.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN 205

reign, as they and their ancestors had done constantly before, to opposition
lead the baronial opposition in Brittany, Maine, and Anjou.

The requirements of revenge and justice being satisfied, the new He attempts
sovereign seems to have determined to bind to himself by gifts and peace the
promises all the leaders, or would-be leaders, of the parties which Ln^arties :
his own quarrels with his father had, if not created, at least furnished
with opportunities for organisation. As soon as he was invested provides for
with the duchy of Normandy he began to make a lavish provision Geoffrey :
for John ; he renewed the promise of the archbishopric of York to
Geoffrey, and he proposed to pay to Philip not only the 20,000/. with ami pays
which Henry had purchased peace, but 4,000/. more to indemnify Philip
him for the expenses of the war ; this done, the two undertook to
meet early in 1190, and proceed to the crusade together. The j"]^1vality to
provision made for John on this occasion was the bestowal of the
county of Mortain, in Normandy, which had been the property of king
Stephen, and had escheated on the death of his son William in 1159, l
and the promise of a revenue of 4,000/. a year 2 from lands in England
with the completion of the marriage contract with the daughter of John's
the last earl of Gloucester, the son of Eobert, who had been betrothed
to John in 1176, and who brought with her by way of dowry the
honour of the earldom of Gloucester.

To all this were added, as soon as the brothers arrived in England, Bestowal of

honours and

the several castles and honours of Marlborough, Lancaster, castles on
Ludgarshall, and the Peak, the castle of Bolsover, the town and
honour of Nottingham, the honours of Wallingford and Tickhill, and
the county of Derby with the Peverell fee.3 It is to be observed

1 I have remarked (vol. ii. p. 6, Rolls John on the occasion of his investiture

Series) on the difficulties attending the as duke of Normandy, July 20, 1189.

statement that John had the county of Ben. Pet. ii. 73.

Mortain before his father's death, 2 Ben. Pet. ii. 73 ; M. Paris, 152.

made by Hoveden (as an addition to This promise of 4,000/. a year in land

Benedict), and also by Richard of was not regarded as fulfilled by the

Devizes, who says, ' prseter comitatum bestowal of the counties shortly after

de Moritonio, quern dono patris mentioned, although it is nearly the

pridem perceperat,' p. 7. William of sum at which their revenues may be

Newburgh (iv. 8) describes Richard as valued; we find that in 1195, when

ratifying his father's gift. The truth John had been removed from the

seems to be that Henry had promised government of the counties, his income

the county and that Richard actually from the exchequer was 8.000Z.

bestowed it. Although count William Hoveden, iii. 28G. But unfortunately

died in 1159, his sister, who married for Richard's character as a liberal

Matthew of Boulogne, carried the brother, the 8.000/. are in Angevin

claim on the county to him. He died money and only equal to 2,OOOZ. ster-

in 1173, and his daughters do not ling. However, it is clear that whilst

seem to have made any claim ; it was he was in charge of the counties, he

in the king's hands in 1180, and was receiving a large sum from the

he had in fact bought off count exchequer. R. Devizes, p. 20.
Matthew's claim in 1168. See 3 These honours were given before

Stapleton, Norman Rolls, i. pp. Ixiii, the coronation, Ben. Pet. ii. 78. The

cxxiii. Benedict distinctly says that money value may be estimated roughly

the county was given by Richard to by reference to the roll of the 3rd of

206

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

OwUwof
the honourn
withheld

Bestowal of
counties

Appoint-
ment* made
at the Coun-
cil of Pipe-
well, to
propitiate
•n Mai

Chnrch
appoint-
ments

that this enumeration of the endowments should be construed exactly
as detailed by Benedict and abridged by Hoveden. In a few cases
the castle and honour are given together, but in the more important
ones, Tickhill, Wallingford, and the impregnable one of Nottingham,1
the honour is given without the castle ; the hold of the crown is
maintained on these castles as well as that of Gloucester, a matter
that has much significance in its relation to later events.2 Not con-
tent with this enormous accession of territory, John received in addi-
tion, before Richard's departure from England, the counties of Devon,
Dorset, Somerset, and Cornwall.3

Immediately after the coronation Richard held a Great Council at
Pipewell, at which he filled up the vacant church preferments, and
changed the sheriffs of the counties in contemplation of the Michael-
mas session of the Exchequer. In the former class of appointments
we trace the working of several natural influences. His father's
servants, Hubert Walter, the nephew of Glanvill ; Richard FitzNeal,
the treasurer of the Exchequer ; Godfrey, the son of Richard of Lucy
the loyal,4 were secured by bishoprics ; and William of S. Mere
1'Eglise, the prothonotary, by a rich stall at York. To his own
personal servant, William Longchamp, he gives a bishopric ; to the
brother of William Marshall, who had been the intimate friend and
companion of his brother Henry, the deanery of York. The old
bishop of Durham is propitiated by the bestowal of the treasurer-
ship of the same church, which had been held by his cousin S.
William and himself in succession, on his nephew Bouchard de
Puiset ; and the services of the Champagne connexion, still so

John, when Wallingford is worth SQL,
Tickhill 851, the Peverell fee 232J.
10s. ; and to the Pipe Boll of 1
Richard I., when the honour of Glou-
cester is worth 548J. 17s. lid., and
Lancaster, 2512. 5s. 10 /.
1 B. Devizes, 30.

2 It is especially noted by Hoveden,
iii. 6.

1 Bestowed in December. Ben.
Pet. ii. 99. The gross values of all
these counties, for Bichard bestows
not only the forms, but all the profits
of administration, were in 1 Bich. I.
as follows : —

Devonshire .

Dorset and Somerset

Cornwall

Notts and Derbyshire

or if the ferms alone be counted, —

Devonshire . .

Cornwall

Dorset and Somerset

Notts and Derby

£

2,041

1,153

512

373

£

312

233

480

319

S.

19

Lfi

8

17

s.
7
4
0

15

a.

in

i

11

9J

1

0
11J

In all 4,08R 9s. Sd.

In all, l,345i. 7s.

4 Jordan Fantosme, p. 71.
Luci.' B. Devizes, 9.

'Godefridus filius memorandi Bicardi illius de

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

207

strong both in France and in England, were further secured by the
nomination of Henry de Soilli,1 to the abbacy of Glastonbury. In
all these, a prudent regard to existing personal or political interests
is distinguishable.

The secular appointments were not bestowed with similar circum-
spection, although the marriages and wardships in the hands of the
crown were distributed on much the same principle. Among the
latter class of preferments, William Marshall got the heiress of the
earldom of Strigul ; the son of Eoger FitzEainfrai, the heiress of the
barony of Kendal ; 2 William Longchamp, the wardship of Stephen
Beauchamp.3 But with the official posts it was otherwise. The
place of Eanulf Glanvill was filled by two old statesmen, Hugh de
Puiset, bishop of Durham, and William Mandeville, earl of Essex and
oount, in the right of his wife, of Aumale, the most faithful servant of
Henry II. ; 4 and this change of the head of the administration was
followed by a clean sweep in the sheriffdoms. It is not clear whether
this was done at Pipewell, or a fortnight later at the Michaelmas
exchequer ; probably it was arranged at the former place, and carried
into execution in the latter. The changes seem to imply an im-
prudent desire on Eichard's part to carry with him most of the leading
members of his father's government ; a desire that was aided by the
fact that most of these were already under a vow of crusade, which
under a king who was himself an ardent crusader, and who had
obtained from the pope the privilege of commuting the vows of his
subjects for a money payment, was not likely to be redeemed with-
out enormous cost.5 In a few cases some method may be traced.
In Yorkshire Eanulf Glanvill gives way to John Marshall, the old
king's friend to the new ; 6 in Herefordshire Ealph Arden, Glanvill's

1 Ben. Pet. ii. 85 ; Hoveden, iii. 15,
note 5.

2 Ben. Pet. ii. 73, 76.

3 I mention this because it seems to
have been a lucrative piece of prefer-
ment. It had been bought by Bertram
de Verdun for 200 marks ; he sold it
to Longchamp for 20 marks' profit.
Madox, Hist. Exch. 691. After the
chancellor's death his brother Henry
had the wardship of the heir of
Stephen, and paid 100Z. for it in the
first year of John. Possibly it was in
this way that he became sheriff of Wor-
cestershire, the hereditary sheriffdom
of which belonged to the Beauchamps.
Rot. de Finibus, 1st John, p. 15.

4 Hoveden adds to Benedict's infor-
mation that Geoffrey FitzPeter,
William Briewere, Robert de Wihtefeld,
and Roger FitzRainfrai were asso-

Secular
preferments

New justi-
ciars

New
sheriffs

Most of the
barous were
under vow of
crusade

The old
king's
friends dis-
placed for
new

ciated in the office. See Ben. Pet. ii.
87 ; Hoveden, iii. 16.

5 Of the barons and justices of
Henry II.'s reign, Ranulf Glanvill,
Bertram de Verdun, Roger Glanvill,
Gilbert Pipard, and others, went with
the king. Geoffrey FitzPeter, William
Briewere, and Hugh Bardolf bought of
the king a licence to stay at home.
R. Dev. p. 8. Hugh Bardolf is men-
tioned as being at Messina in Novem-
ber, 1190 ; Hoveden, iii. 62 ; and even
William Marshall must have been
there early in 1191, if we are to take
literally the words of Benedict, ii. 158,
Hoveden, iii. 96. Yet he was acting as
a judge in England very shortly before
(Mon. Angl. i. 391) ; perhaps he accom-
panied and returned with Eleanor.

6 Glanvill had administered York-
shire by his steward Reiner, who went

208

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDKN

Purchase of
sheriffdoms
Hud caitlw

Weakening
of the

government
in conse-
quence

Sale of the
juBticiarship
and chan-
cellorship

son-in-law, is replaced by Henry Longchamp, the chancellor's brother.
Such appointments strengthened, no doubt, the hands of the king's
personal friends. Others, however, must have seriously weakened
the administration. Among these the foremost are the purchase
of sheriffdoms by three of the bishops : Hugh de Puiset, of Durham,
buys Northumberland for 2,000 marks ; [ Godfrey de Lucy, by a
single fine, obtained for himself the county of Hampshire, with the
castles of Winchester and Porchester, his own inheritance, and in-
demnity for the treasure of his church ; a Hugh of Nunant, bishop of
Coventry, was allowed to take for a smaller fine the sheriffdoms of
Leicestershire, Staffordshire and Warwickshire.3 The counties
bestowed on John were withdrawn from the ordinary administration
of the government. Gerard Camville, one of his sworn followers,
for 700 marks, entered on the sheriffdom of Lincolnshire ; 4 Hugh of
Nunant was also his personal adherent. Of the other counties, only
seven or eight retained their old sheriffs, and only five of the old
sheriffs s found places in the same capacity : these were old servants
of the state, not likely to become politically dangerous. But the
changes in the sheriffdoms are not to be imputed solely to Richard's
wish to carry with him to Palestine all the men of mark ; in some
cases the office was doubtless bought. Those officers who were re-
moved were not disgraced, for out of them, after making them pay
heavily for the commutation of their vows, Richard chose the chief
advisers of the regency. The great offices of state were, moreover
paid for by their fortunate holders ; Hugh de Puiset paid at least a
thousand marks for his share of the justiciarship,'5 and William
Longchamp, although the king's confidant, paid three thousand for
the chancery, notwithstanding that the bishop of Bath bid a
thousand more.7 Other very large sums were levied on the barons
and bishops for the ratification of rights and confirmation of their
tenure of estates, the greatest bargain being that made by the king

with him on crusade, and died in
Cyprus. Ben. Pet. ii. 150. He had
rendered account of a fine of 1,000
marks on his own accunt in the second
of Richard I. (Pipe Roll) ; another
proof of the way in which as Richard
of Devizes describes, the Glanvill con-
nexion was plundered at this time.

1 Pipe Roll, 2 Ric. I. :— ' Hugo epi-
scopus Dunelm. debet MM. marcas pro
comitatu Northumbriro habendo.' He
gave 1,000 marks for the justiciarship,
Ben. Pet. ii. 90 ; 600 for Sadberge,
Hoveden, iii. 39. Richard of Devizes
raises the sum of money invested by
him to 10.000J., p. 8.

* For 3,000*., R. Devizes, p. 10.

Another 3,0007. he paid for the re-
storation of Meon and Wargrave, Rot.
Pip. 2 R. I.

1 For 300 marks, Madox, Hist.
Exch. 316.

4 ' Oerardus de Camvilla reddit
computum de 700 marcis pro vice-
comitatu Lincoln, et castello civitatis
habendis.' Rot. Pip. 2 Ric. I.

1 Oger Fitz-Oger, Henry de Cornhell,
William Ruffus, William FitzHervey.
Robert de la Mara ; others, however,
probably acted under John in his
counties.

• See above, note 1.

7 R. Devizes, p. 9.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN 209

of Scots, who, for a payment of 10,OOOZ., emancipated himself from
the conditions imposed on him by Henry II. in 1175. But the
object of these latter sales was merely the raising of money.

By such means Eichard endeavoured to secure peace during his Theory of
absence from Europe ; his policy was to work the governmental policy
machinery by men who were not likely to be dangerous, to bribe by
large benefactions those whose claims might have made them so,
to bind those who had invested their treasure so largely in public
appointments to the maintenance of public security, to carry away
with him as much as possible of the money which might have
sustained private wars, and as many as possible of those members
of the feudal baronage whose possessions were so large or their
traditions so continuous as to render them jealous of royal authority.
But before he left England he had reason to see that all this would
be futile. The death of William Mandeville in November left the
iusticiarship vacant, for Hugh de Puiset could not be trusted to act Early m-

, .. . . , ., ,. , . . , . dicationsof

alone — nay, it was a question whether the king ever seriously in- its failure
tended him to act in this capacity at all. The archbishop elect of York
had quarrelled with his clergy and fallen into disgrace with Eichard,
and it was found necessary to secure John with further gifts. The king
was, however, in a hurry to embark, and perhaps not unwilling to leave
matters to settle themselves. The bishop of Durham was left as
justiciar, but with the chancellor, Hugh Bardulf, and William
Briewere as colleagues.1 Further questions were to be settled at a
council in Normandy before the pilgrimage to the East began.

Eichard left England on the llth of December. Almost im- The jus
mediately after his departure the chancellor and justiciar quarrelled, quarrel
The bishop of Durham saw that the bishop of Ely was intended to Thcseem-
hold the substance of power, whilst, even if faith were to be kept with trary oon-
himself , there would be left him only the shadow, the expense, and chancellor"
the responsibility. To him the castle of Windsor had been intrusted ;
but to the chancellor the Tower of London.2 Longchamp was not
indisposed for a struggle ; he declined to admit the presence of the
bishop of Durham at the Exchequer,3 or to recognise him as in
charge of the county of Northumberland. No reason is given for
this, but the probable one is that the bishop had not actually paid
the money offered for the county,4 and that the chancellor acted
under Eichard's orders. At the same time, however, he dispossessed

1 Ben. Pet. ii. 101. Hoveden makes intervened between the king's depar-

the chancellor co-justiciar, and Hugh ture and his summons to Normandy.
Bardulf, William Marshall, Geoffrey 2 Benedict, ii. 101. Hoveden, iii.

FitzPeter, and William Briewere, 28.
associates; a different committee from s R. Devizes, p. 11.
that appointed at Pipewell. It is not 4 The money is still a debt in the

improbable that Hugh was really the P pe Roll of 2 Rich. II.; that is, at

chief justiciar for the short time that Michaelmas 1190.

P

210

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

The chan-
cellor quar-
n-ls with the
MR hope of
Durham,
Winchester,
and
Coventry

Complaints
laid before
the king

The jus-

ticiarship

divided

Lougchamp
to be legate

Difficulties
of Long-
chnmp's
task

Removal of
the great
earls and
bishops

Power of
Hugh de
Puiset

the bishop of Winchester of the honours he had purchased, and even
of his own inheritance, on which he had so lately entered.1 In this
case the desire of getting both the sheriffdom and the castles into
the hands of the government probably operated. As for the
bishop of Coventry, it was thought sufficient to proceed against him
in the ecclesastical court, and obtain an injunction from the arch-
bishop of Canterbury against his holding a sheriffdom.2

When in the month of February or early in March the king held
his council in Normandy, complaints on all these grounds were laid
before him. Most of the leading men in England attended ; the
chief business done was the appointment of the chancellor as
justiciar of England, the bishop of Durham's jurisdiction being
confined to the north of the Humber ; 3 John and Geoffrey were
sworn not to return to England for three years. Hugh of Nunant
undertook before the archbishop to give up his secular office.
Measures were also taken to obtain for the chancellor the office of
legate in the absence of Archbishop Baldwin.

Notwithstanding the great powers with which Longchamp was
now invested, the task which he undertook was probably as difficult
a one as ever fell to the lot of any minister. He was, indeed, trusted
by his master, but he could have hardly trusted Richard out of his
sight, knowing how uncertain were the expedients of his fickle policy,
how easily he was imposed upon, and how his inveterate extra-
vagance laid him open to intrigues in which money would be too
powerful a temptation for him to resist. The condition of England
was anything but bettered by Richard's policy. The great earls of
Chester and Leicester, the great minister Glanvill, and his colleagues
Bertram de Verdun, Gilbert Pipard, and others, the great bishops
Hubert of Salisbury, and Walter of Rouen, were indeed gone ; and
John and Geoffrey were sworn to stay away. But the uneasiness was
not removed with them ; the sources of disturbance were in the
very atmosphere of society. The removal of the great men made
the country more difficult to manage, the balance more difficult to
adjust. Hugh de Puiset had made himself a comfortable principality
in the north, where the justiciarshipof the whole province was added

1 R. Devizes, 11.

2 See the letter from Archbishop
Baldwin to the bishop of London, in
R. de Diceto, 652 : Hugh had at Rouen
promised to resign his sheriffdom
within a fortnight after Easter. In
the Roll of the 2nd of Richard I., he
renders account for Warwickshire and
Leicestershire for half a year, and
Hugh Bardulf for the second half, and
in 1191 Hugh Bardulf accounts for the

whole year in Warwickshire and
Leicestershire, while the bishop has
had Staffordshire for a whole year. It
would seem, then, that he had obeyed
the archbishop's command as long as
he lived. In 1192 he accounts for all
the three counties.

1 Ben. Pet. ii. 106. Hoveden, iii. 32.
Longchamp is now ' summus justi-
tiarius.' R. Devizes, 14.

THE CHKONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

211

to his ordinary and palatine jurisdiction as bishop, and the newly-
purchased earldom or sheriffdom of Northumberland. John had an
equally compact, though less extensive, dominion in the west ; and
in the middle of England, he and his friends possessed a band of
jurisdictions and castles reaching through the counties of Lincoln,
Nottingham, Derby, Leicester, Warwick, and Stafford. Although
of the towns of this midland territory many, if not all, were faithful
to the crown, and some of the castles were still retained by the king
as a check on his brother, the whole of the ordinary jurisdiction was
withdrawn from the direct action of the justiciar. John's own
counties rendered no account at the Exchequer, and their judicial
business was managed by his own justiciar ; in the shires under
Hugh of Nunant and Gerard Camville, the influence of the justiciar
could not be available without the co-operation of the sheriff. The
chancellor could regard only the east and south-east of England as
really amenable to his authority. Any attempt to exert it beyond
these limits would necessarily lead to a complication with one or all
of his rivals.

Hugh de Puiset was a man whose ancestors had been accustomed
to deal on an equality with kings, and to give them no small trouble.
He was, in all probability, the son of that Hugh de Puiset,1 viscount

1 It is impossible to speak with
entire certainty of the parentage of
Hugh de Puiset, but I believe the
following to be the truth. I should say
that the whole pedigree of the Puisets
is difficult to make out. The Puisets
were lords of the castle of that name
near Chartres, and the head of the
family was hereditary viscount of
Chartres. I. Ebrard, viscount of
Chartres, and his wife Hunbergis were
the parents of Hugh de Puiset, vis-
count of Chartres, and Adelaide the
wife of Roger Montgomery the ally of
William the Conqueror. (Cartulaire de
S. Pierre de Chartres, 159. Ord. Vit. v.
13.) II. Hugh de Puiset, viscount of
Chartres, married Adelaide of Mont-
Iheri, sister of Guy de Bochfort, dapifer
to the king of France. He was
viscount hi 1096 and had three sons,
Ebrard, Hugh, and Guy, and a daughter
Hunbergis. (Cartulaire, &c. p. 240.)
III. Of these three sons, Guy was
viscount of Etampes; Hugh married
Mamilia de Boucy and went to the
Holy Land about 1106. (Will. Tyr.
xiv. 15.) Ebrard went on the first
crusade and took part in the siege of
Antioch in 1097. (W. Tyr. vi. 4 ; Alb.
Aq. 236, 255.) IV. The next viscount

of Chartres is Hugh de Puiset, the
enemy of Lewis VI., who is described by
Abbot Suger as the nephew of Guy of
Etampes, and son of the countess Ade-
laide of Corbeil. (Opp. Suger. ed. Le
Coy de la Marche, p. 70.) His father had
gone on the first crusade. He was,
then, the son of Ebrard who died at
Antioch, and, as viscount, agrees with
the abbot of S. Pierre for the com-
memoration of his father Ebrard as
soon as the day of his death is known.
(Cartulaire &c. 452.) V. This Hugh
had a wife Agnes, and two sons, Ebrard
and Bouchard (Cart. p. 412), of
whom Ebrard was viscount of Chartres
1143. (Cart. 644 ; Bouquet, xv. 493.)
VI. The next viscount is Hugh de
Puiset, count of Bar, son of Ebrard
(Ben. Pet. i. 278), and nephew of Hugh
de Puiset bishop of Durham. There-
fore bishop Hugh must have been a
younger son of Hugh and Agnes, and
Agnes must have been an unknown
daughter of Count Stephen of Blois
and Adela the daughter of William the
Conqueror. This pedigree, which has
given me a good deal of trouble, will be
found to agree with the charters and
historians, but not with the deductions
of the French genealogists, who rather
p 2

Localisation
of parties

Withdrawal
of John's
counties
from the
ordinary
jurisdiction
of the
justiciar

Ancestry of
Hugh de
Puiset

212

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

Inheritance
of turbulent
tradition*

Family of
Bishop Hugh

HU early
promotion,
versatility,
and ex-
perience

of Chartres, who had for many years defied the power of Lewis VI.
Another Hugh de Puiset, his cousin,1 had nearly produced a revolution
in Palestine ; another ancestor, Bouchard of Corbeil, had attempted to
wrest the crown of France from Philip I.2 Hugh himself was a
great-grandson of William the Conqueror ; nephew of Stephen, of
Henry of Winchester, and Theobald of Champagne ; cousin to both
Richard I. and Philip II. Adelidis, the mother of one at least of
the bishop's children, was a lady of the great house of Percy,9 and
this connexion added the influence of her family to the other sources
of the bishop's strength. One of his sons, also Hugh de Puiset, had
been chancellor to Lewis VII.4 Hugh had had now a longer tenure
of power than any man of his mark in Europe. At an early age he
had been made treasurer of York, in which capacity he had styled
himself Hugh, ' by the grace of God, treasurer and archdeacon ' ;
had fought the battles in court, council and chapter, of his cousin
3. William, and had headed the garrisons and trained the soldiers of
Henry of Winchester when Henry II. was yet a child.5 He had

ignore bishop Hugh. In addition to
the references given above, compare
Martene and Durand, Amplissiina
Coll., i. 774 ; Bouquet, xv. 493 ; Du-
chesne, iv. 528. The identification
of Hugh the viscount, as the son of
Ebrard, is proved by the charter of the
abbey of S. Pierre, in which he refers
to his imprisonment ; Cart. &c. 452 ;
Suger, pp. 73, 76 ; and that of his son
Ebrard by the letter of Lewis VII.
Cart., Ac., 644.

1 Hugh the younger, son of Hugh
and Mamilia de Roucy, count of Joppa.
See W. Tyr. xiv. 15.

2 Suger, V. Ludov. VI. p. 80. He
was slain by Stephen of Blois. Ib. 81.
He was father of Adelaide the wife of
Ebrard, and grandmother of the
bishop.

1 According to William of New-
burgh, v. 11, the bishop was father of
three sons by three different ladies
before he took priest's orders, but as one
of the persons called by the historian
his sons was his nephew Bouchard,
archdeacon of Durham, the rest of the
story may be apocryphal. Two sons
he is known to have had, of both
of whom Adelaide may have been the
mother, as she certainly was of his son
Henry. This Henry gave Stockdale
to Sal lay Abbey ' pro salute animta meaa
et Adelidis de Perci matris meae et
Dionysite sponsaa mee .... sicut in
cartis Ricardi de Morevill et Willelmi

de Perci continentur.' Mon. Angl. v.
510. Adelidis de Percy had another
son named Alan de Morvill, who con-
firmed a donation which Adelidis de
Percy his mother had made to Henry
de Puiset his brother, of all the land of
Settle and the church of Oiggleswick.
Whitaker, History of Craven, p. 111.
She probably had married a Morvill
after Hugh became a bishop. Henry
de Puiset's wife Dionysia was a
daughter of Odo de Thilli, of the
family to which Randulf de Thilli, arch-
bishop Roger's constable, belonged.
Madox, Hist. Exch. p. 356, from
Pipe Roll of 31 Hen. II. It is clear
that the connexion of the Puisetsand
Percies was very close, and that the
former had gained a strong position in
Yorkshire. Henry de Puiset was a
great benefactor of Finchale priory.

4 See Ben. Pet. i. 241 ; W. Newb. v.
11. He is to be distinguished from
Hugh the count of Bar on the Seine,
the bishop's nephew, who comes more
into English history and was buried in
the Galilee at Durham, Ben. Pet. ii. 92.
The bishop's son, who was chancellor
in 1180, died before 1185. He was the
youngest of the family.

* John of Hexham, ed. Raine, p. 155.
'Qui Hugo thesaurarius interim epi-
scopates possessiones Wintoniec et
castra cum militari manu ipsemilitans
defensabat.' Ibid. p. 158. Mon. Angl.
v. 494.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN 213

every opportunity and many qualifications for becoming a very great
man, and in spite of his failures he left a mark upon the north of
England which is not yet effaced. He was a man of grand stature,
and singularly noble face,1 eloquent, energetic, a mighty hunter,2 a character
great shipmaster,3 a magnificent builder, an able defender and of Hugh de
besieger, a consummate intriguer, and a very wary politician.4
Against great odds he had retained his position through all the His earlier
struggles of Henry's reign. Of the Becket quarrel he kept himself
comparatively clear, sympathising, doubtless, as his uncle of
Winchester and his cousin of Sens did, with the ecclesiastical
principles of the martyr, but unwilling to risk anything by taking
a decided part against the king. The death of the bishop of
Winchester in 1171, and his own close connexion with the French
court, induced him in 1173 to take a more hazardous part, and
although not actually to rebel, to attempt the position of mediator
which had- been held by his uncle in the contest between Stephen
and Matilda, but which Matilda's son was little likely to regard as
loyal. His temporising policy on this occasion drew down on him the
severe animadversion of Henry,5 but he was not, like Arnulf of
Lisieux, a prelate who could be driven into resignation. Henry

doubtless saw that his own policy was to make it the bishop's nearest
interest to be faithful, and not to risk on the side of Scotland the
substitution of a weaker, even if more trustworthy, champion. By
every turn of affairs, then, he had gained power, and could he have
realised the authority apparently intrusted to him by Richard, he
would have exercised during the remaining years of his life a rule
more exactly resembling that of the great ecclesiastical princes of
Germany than anything that has ever existed in England. We

1 Geoff. Coldingham, Scr. Duntlm, Madox, Hist. Excli. 493.

p. 4. This writer makes bishop Hugh * His character is drawn by William

only 25 at the time of his election to of Newburgh, v. 10.

Durham in 1152; if this is right he 5 Ben. Pet. i. 64, 67. His policy is,

must have been trained early to the I think, quite that of the Champagne

use of arms, as he was early preferred counts and bishops : resistance to

in the church. But he was probably the royal authority on ecclesiastical

older. grounds; inallothermatters,thoroughly

2 On his ' caza ' or chase in the secular. Hugh is always found on
forest of Weardale, which was quite on the clerical side, although he had
a royal scale, like everything else about very little that was clerical about him ;
him, see Boldon Bickc, ed. Greenwell, and so helped to thwart Archbishop
pp. liv, Iv. His hunting hall, built Geoffrey, and was always on the best
for each chase by the villeins of Auck- terms with the popes. Without being
land, was 60 feet long, chapel and a great man, he was always in a great
kitchen, &c., in proportion. position, and seldom unequal to the

8 On his ships see Surtees' account occasion. His biography, if it could

of him in the Hist, of Durham, Cold- be written in detail, would be a diplo-

ingham, p. 13 : — " Naves pulcherrimas matic or political history of at least

. . . ut majorum episcoporum sive fifty eventful years of English national

ducum gloriam superaret.' Also life.

214

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDKN

Contrast of
Hugh de
1'uiset with
William
Longcbamp

Pamlly
history of

William
Liongchninp

picture him as like one of those grand stern figures that look down
in stone from the walls and piers of the cathedrals of Menu,
Wiirzburg, and Bamberg. He was very ambitious, not more than
commonly unprincipled or unscrupulous, and, with the exception of
the shortsightedness inseparable from a narrow personal selfishness,
an able, as he was a very experienced, man. He seems to have
possessed strong affections, and, notwithstanding their constant ill-
usage of him, to have been personally a friend of both Henry l and
his sons. His charm of manner and good nature, perhaps, did as
much for the permanence of his power as did the versatility of his
policy.

Such was the first enemy, for he was an enemy by the very
necessity of the case, whom William Longchamp had to encounter ;
a man whose position, character, and history stood in the most
marked contrast with his own. William Longchamp was a novus
homo. Without crediting the ill-natured statement of Hugh of
Nunant 2 and Giraldus 3 that his grandfather was a runaway serf
who had escaped from the Beauvaisis into Normandy, it may be
considered as certain that that grandfather was the founder of the
family. William was a son of Hugh de Longchamp,4 who, so far
as we can see, was the person to whom, early in the reign of Henry
II., lands in Herefordshire had been given by the king ; 5 who held
in the same county a knight's fee under the house of Lacy,6 and in
Normandy the office of former of the Honour of Conches.7 He took
his name from the ducal demesne and castle of Longchamp, one of

1 So far as Henry is concerned this
is an inference from the treatment he
received from him. Richard, although
he sometimes made a jest of him, and
certainly plundered him cruelly, seems
to have been as fond of him as of any
one ; interfered promptly when Long-
champ went beyond his orders, and
treated him personally with great
regard. See Hoveden, iii. 239. Cold
ingham mentions that Richard used
to call him his father, p. 14; and
both he and John always recognised
the near relationship. John even
carried it on to the next generation,
calling Henry de Pniset his cousin.
Rot. Cart. (ed. Hardy), p. 126.

1 See Ben. Pet. ii. 216; Hoveden,
iii. 142.

1 Oir. Camb. V. Oalfr. in Ang. Sac.
ii. 404.

« 'VIII. kal. Nov. obiit Hugo de
Longocampo, et Willelmus films ejus
Ehelyensis episcopus.' Necrology of
Rouen, among the Rolls' Transcripts :

' Archives of Normandy, No. 412,
excerpta ex necrologio ecclesiae Rotho-
magensis de obitu principum Anglie.'

5 ' In terris datis Hugoni de Longo-
campo 16 1. 10 s. in Lintuna et in
Wiltuna.' Rot. Pip. 8 Hen. II. p. 93,
also pp. 51, 144. 1 am aware that
Dugdale decidedly denies the con-
nexion of the chancellor with this
family, but the following notes will
probably be thought to be proof
enough.

* Liber Niger Scaccarii (ed. Hearne),
p. 155 : Among the knight's fees of
Hugh de Lacy, 'et feoduni unius
militis de feodo antique quod oblitus
sum, feodum Willelmi de Burehopa
quod tenet Hugo de Longo Canipo in
maritagio ' ; and p. 159 : ' Henricus
de Longocampo tenet Wilton per
unum feodum.' 'Rex pater regis
Johannis dedit Wilton Hugoni ob gen.'
Testa de Nevill, p. 70.

7 Stapleton, Rolls of the Norman
Exchequer, i. 74, Ac.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN 215

the four castles in the forest of Lions, in which he occupied a small
holding. He seems to have married a Lacy,1 and perhaps was one
of those knights who made their fortunes in the service of the
younger Henry. In the year 1180 he was in disgrace, being greatly
in debt to the exchequer of the duchy, and having failed to present
himself before the justiciar when he was summoned. His balance
of account unpaid for the honour of Conches was upwards of 700Z.,
and he owed besides for purprestures in the forest, for the rents of
the carpenters of Longchamp, and an amercement of 100Z. for non-
appearance and waste.2 That his difficulties were the result of Difficulties
political misconduct appears from the statement of Giraldus, that ii^g0tamp
the chancellor had been spoken of by Henry II. as a traitor on
both father's and mother's side.3 The date of his appointment to
Conches would tally very nearly with the period of the younger
Henry's ascendency in Normandy. That he was a man of mark
may be inferred from the fact that Ralph Tesson, Reginald of
Pavilly, and Richard Vernon, three of the great barons of Normandy,
were among the sureties for the payment of his debt, a fourth
being his son, Hugh de Longchamp the younger.4 To this Hugh
the estate of Wilton in Herefordshire is stated to have been given by
his father,5 although the person whom we first find administering it
was named Henry. The elder Hugh must have had a large family ; Brothers of
among his sons were, besides the chancellor and the second Hugh,6

1 See note 6, p. 214. from the Pipe Eoll, 1 Rio. I., that both

2 ' Rob. de Stoteville debet 23 s. 4 d. Walter de Lacy and Henry Long-
de censibus porpresturarum in Longo champ had been kept out of their
Campo recuperatis per juream, quas Herefordshire estates by Henry II.,
Hugo de Longo Campo tenebat .... and only restored to them on his
Prater haec LI acra et dim. virgata death, pp. 141, 145.

terra quas Hugo et homines ejus tene- 4 Stapleton, Rolls, &c., i. 64, 80, 96,

bant sunt recuperatsa per juream . . . &c.

Hugo de Long Campo debet 7061. 17s. 5 Rot. Cart. R. Joh. p. 146:—

vi d. de rem. computi sui de honore de ' Sciatis nos concessisse . . . Henrico

Conches. Et 8 1. 8 s. de porpresturis de Longo Campo, assensu et con-

forestaa de Leons de septem annis et cessione Gaufridi fratris sui primo-

unoquoque anno 24 s. Et 66 1. 10 s. de geniti, Wilton in Herefordsiria cum

censibus carpentariorum de Longo castello . . . qua Hugo avus suus

Campo de septem annis et xi. mensi- dedit Hugoni patri ejusdem Henrioi.'

bus. Et de hoc anno 7 1. 10 s. Et 100 1. Mar. 7, 1205.

de misericordia sua pro pradictis por- * This Hugh, if he was the father of

presturis et quia non venit ad sub- Geoffrey Longchamp, son of Emma

monitionem justitiarii. Et pro wasto of S. Leger, who afterwards married

de districto de Longo Campo.' R. Walter Baskerville, must have died

Stapleton, Rolls &c. i. 74. before 1195, as in that year Geoffrey

* V. Galfr. p. 390. ' Improperabat fines as his mother's heir. Anyhow,

enim eidem pluries quod proditorem Geoffrey was one of the family, for

suum et proditionis hseredem ex Osbert Longchamp is his pledge,

utroque parente familiarem habebat.' Madox, Hist. Exch., 356. See more

See also p. 405. It would appear of Geoffrey below, p. 258, note 4.

216

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

Brother*

and -i-t.-r-
of 1 1..-
chancellor

Description
of Long-
champ's
person

Career of

William

Longchamp

Stephen, steward of Normandy,1 Henry,2 sheriff of Herefordshire,
Osbert,8 sheriff of Yorkshire, and afterwards of Norfolk and Suffolk,
and Robert, who was abbot of 8. Mary's at York. Of his daughters,
one, Richenda, was married to Mathew de Cleres, castellan of Lions
and Dover ; and another to the head of the Herefordshire house of
Evreux.4

At its best the origin of the chancellor was very humble compared
with that of the bishop of Durham. His personal qualifications
were scarcely less so. That he was the monster of ugliness that
Giraldus depicts,4 more like an ape than a man, deformed and lame,
we may safely set down as an exaggeration ; but the utmost that a
tolerant critic could say for him was that his person was respectable,''
and that it required all the greatness of his mind to compensate for
the shortness of his body. And the careers of the two statesmen
were in strong contrast ; whilst Hugh de Puiset had been plotting
and warring, William had been working as a clerk in the chancery,
first under Geoffrey, who had made him his official in the arch-
deaconry of Rouen,7 then under Richard, who had made him his
confidant and chaplain before he came to the crown.8 His rise from
such a post to that of chancellor, justiciar, and legate was very
sudden, and shows that he possessed in an extreme degree the confi-
dence of his master as well as great ambition and confidence in himself.
The horrid accusations of immorality brought against him by
Giraldus 9 defeat themselves ; they are the utterance of a spiteful

1 Stephen Longchamp had Frome
Herbert in Herefordshire of the gift of
Walter de Lacy, and Mutford in Suffolk
in right of his wife Petronilla, daughter
of Osbert de Cailly and Hildeburga,
lady of Baudemont. This connexion
accounts for the mention of him in
the treaty between Philip and Richard
in 1195, and for his relations with
Henry de Vere. See below, p. 240.
Stapleton, Rolls, &c. II. czi. Ac. Rot.
Pip. 8 John, Ac.

1 Henry, the chancellor's brother,
is identified with the sheriff of
Herefordshire by the mention of his
imprisonment at Cardiff. Gir. Camb.
V. Oalfr. p. 399. The sheriff was
prevented by imprisonment from
rendering his accounts in 1192, and
released before the Exchequer session
of 1193.

1 Osbert's career will be found
worked out further on, and Robert's
also.

4 Stephen Devereux in 1205 had
Frome Herbert by the gift of his
uncle Stephen Longchamp. Rot.

Cart. R. Joh. p. 156. He was a
nephew also of the chancellor. See
Eyton's Hist. Shropshire, v. 21.

» V. Galfr. part ii. 19, p. 405:—
1 Statura exigua despectaque . . .
claudus . . . capite grosso . . .
simiam simulans . . . facie canina
. . . mcnto reflexo . . . collo con-
tracto, pectore gibboso, ventre prteam-
bulo, renibus retrogradis, tibiis tortis,
et in modico corpore pes immensus.'

• R. Devizes, p. 11 : — ' Persona
spectabilis, brevitatem corporis animo
recompensans.'

' Gir. Camb. V. Galfr. p. 390.

• R. Devizes, p. 6: — 'Ante coronam
comitis Pictavorum fuerat cancel -
larius.'

• V. Galfr. p. 406. It is impos-
sible, if there were any truth in such
charges, that John should have
charged him, as his most offensive
crime, with introducing into England
the foreign custom of serving on the
knee : R. Devizes, p. 81. The whole
may be based on the story of Eleanor's
refusal to intrust her grandson to his

THE CHEONICLE OF EOGEE OF HOVEDEN 217

and defeated antagonist, one, moreover, whose words on a question
of personal interest are never worthy of consideration. All that we
really gather from his description is, that William was a plain, short,
lame man, who did not understand English, and who was very
imprudent in showing his dislike to the nation that he had to govern.1
Against the charges of immorality, so easy to bring and so hard to
repel, which both his chief assailants allege against him, we must set
the panegyrics of the monks of Canterbury, who dared not have taken improba-
as their patron a bishop of notoriously evil life ; 2 of Peter of Blois, tetnga* h'
who had nothing in common with the monks,3 but was a sincerely vlcl<
pious man ; Nigel Wireker, of whose sincerity and desire of reform
there can be no doubt, and who actually dedicated to him his satire
on the manners of the age.4 It is, however, simply impossible that
such a man as Giraldus describes should have been tolerated in an
age and country in which S. Hugh of Lincoln was religiously all-
powerful. S. Hugh does not seem to have liked the chancellor's
policy ; their political principles were opposed, and the Saint took
part in the proceedings against Longchamp in defence of Archbishop
Geoffrey ; but their personal relations were not unkind, and the
chancellor seems to have trusted implicitly to the bishop's good
will.5 The man who would not tolerate the dead bones of Fair
Rosamond within the choir of Godstow would not have hesitated
to denounce a profligate in the sacred offices of legate and bishop.6
Setting aside, then, these calumnies, his character seems to have
been this : — He was a strong-minded, ambitious, self-confident, reso- Theory of
lute man ; faithful to his master, ready and active in his service ;
unsparing of labour, energetic, and unwearied ; relentless in exactions

care (ibid. p. 403), and on the mere solebant "Eamus facere Anglicum." '

insinuations of Hugh of Nunant in V. Galfr. p. 407.

his letter against him. Hoved. iii. - Epp. Cantuar. p. 354 ; and see
142, <fec. the introduction to that book, pp.
1 Although there is no reason what- Ixxxv, Ixxxvi, &c. ; also Wharton's note
ever to believe Giraldus, he states this in Anglia Sacra, i. 632.
in a circumstantial way ; and it is at s Hoveden, iii. 148-150.
all events important, as showing that 4 Leyser, Hist. Poetarum, p. 754 ;
although the leading men in England and compare the note in Epp. Can-
were still all of Norman blood, it was tuar. pp. Ixxxv, Ixxxvi.
beginning to be regarded as an unwise 5 Hoveden, iii. 152-154. Bened. ii.
thing to despise the English. He is 223, 224.

arguing so as to excite odium among 6 The same argument is available

a people who felt themselves English : in defence of Eichard himself, against

' Anglos autem cum tota curia sua whom the like charges are insinuated,

tanto et tarn in exorabili est odio perse- S. Hugh of Lincoln heard his con-

cutus, ut usuali verbo in eorum oppro- fessions and declared that his most

brium et improperium dicere consue- crying sins were his unfaithfulness to

verint : " Anglicus fiam, si hoc fecero. his wife, which was notorious, and his

Pejor sum Anglico si illud admisero." carelessness in the use of church

Ad injuriarum quoque cumulum, et patronage. Magna Vita S. Hugonis,

dedecoris argumentum cum ad ex- p. 255.
quisita naturae pergere parabant, dicere

218

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

Character of
Longcuamp

After the
council in
Normandy
tie returns to
England

Panic of the
Jews at York

Frightful
catastrophe
of the Jews
at York

and oppressions where his master's interests could be advanced by
such means ; fearless to rashness in his undertakings ; greedy of
advancement for his family ; intolerant of opposition or equality ;
devoid of tact in dealing with his peers and of sympathy with his
inferiors ; probably, as appears from the general tone of his history as
told by neutrals as well as by enemies, elated by the greatness of his
position beyond the ordinary exultation of the upstart. He was thus
a man whose nobler as well as meaner qualities would lay him open
to attack from the king's enemies and his own competitors for power.
William Longchamp had been consecrated to the see of Ely on
the last day of 1189, and enthroned with great pomp on the feast of
the Epiphany 1190.1 Before the end of February, * having quarrelled
with the co-justiciar, he joined the king in Normandy, where he
stayed till Easter, and immediately after the festival returned to
England with full powers ; the bishop of Durham remaining behind
to secure his grant of the justiciarship of the north, and the bishop
of Winchester to obtain the restitution of his purchased honours.3
The first event of the chancellor's government was untoward. The
Jews of York, alarmed by the riot which had taken place at London
on the occasion of the coronation, and was followed by similar
outbreaks at Norwich in February, at Stamford in March, at Bury
St. Edmund's on Palm Sunday, and at almost every large town
except Winchester,4 had obtained, in expectation of a general rising,
permission from John Marshall, the sheriff of Yorkshire, to occupy
a tower in the castle of York. Thither they had removed their
families. Before the alarm had blown over, the sheriff ordered the
Jews to quit the tower, and on their demurring called out the force
of the county against them. The knights of Yorkshire besieged the
castle, and the Jews, on the Friday before Palm Sunday, slew their
wives and children, shut themselves up in the tower, set it on fire,
and perished in it. The citizens and knights thereupon seized the
Jews' houses in York and burned them, destroying with them the
bonds by which the debts due to them were secured, and on which
the whole banking business of the north depended.* The leaders of

1 Anglia Sacra, i. 632.

1 Benedict, ii. 106. He was at
Westminster on the 24th of January,
where he attested a charter together
with the bishops of London, Durham,
and Coventry, with the other justices.
Eyton, Hist. Shropshire, vii. 12. In
Normandy, on the 14th of March, John
of Alencon, the vice-chancellor, was
acting for him, but on the 20th he is
at Rouen with the king, also on the
22nd and 23rd ; on the 27th he was at

Lions. Feed. i. 51.

1 R. Devizes, p. 11-13. Ben. P. ii.
109.

4 R. Devizes, p. 5. W. Newb. lib.
iv. cc. 7-11. It is a curious coinci-
dence that whilst the Jews were being
persecuted in the towns, Richard was
issuing charters of protection for
them, especially on March 22. See
Foed. i. 51.

5 Benedict, ii. 107 ; Hoveden, iii. 38.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

219

the knights in this exploit were Philip of Falconberge, Kichard
Malebysse, William Percy, and Marmaduke Darrell.1

Immediately on the chancellor's return from Normandy, early in
May,2 he visited York with a military force under his brother Henry.3
The citizens denied all complicity with the persecutors, several of
whom had fled to Scotland.4 Longchamp, unable or unwilling to
use harsh measures, accepted a fine from the citizens,5 and took
hostages of them, who were sent in custody to Northampton.6 He
inflicted, however, severe penalties on the knights who had taken the
lead in the transaction. John Marshall he removed from the
sheriffdom, appointing his own brother Osbert 7 in his place. It was
unfortunate that, whether justly or not, the punishment fell most
heavily on the adherents of the Percies, the relations and allies of
the bishop of Durham. The lands of William Percy and Richard
Malebysse, his kinsman,8 with those of their squires, were seized to
the king's use : the entire property of the fugitives was also
confiscated, and the money due to the Jews was collected where it

Conduct of
the York-
shire knights

Longchamp
visits York,

1 Chron. de Melsa, i. 251.

* ' Circa Dominica Ascensionis
solemnia.' W. Newb. iv. 11.

1 ' Henrico de Longo Campo et aliis
militibusquiabieruntEboracumpropter
occisionem Judseorum, Ix. li. per breve
Cancellarii.' Eot. Pip. 2 Ric. I.,
Lincolnshire.

4 ' De exitu terrarum et catallorum
hominum qui aufugerunt pro assultu
Judseorum in civitate Eboracensi.'
Rot. Pip. 2 Ric. I. ; W. Newb. iv. 11.

4 W. Newb. iv. 11.

8 Rot. Pip. 5 Ric. I. :— ' Gives
Eboraci reddunt computum de x
marcis pro habendis obsidibus suis qui
fuerunt Norhantonise propter occisio-
nem Judaeorum.' This was in 1193,
when Longchamp was out of the way
and the affair had blown over.

7 Hoveden, iii. 34. In the Pipe
Roll, 2 Rich. I. John Marshall accounts
for Yorkshire for half a year, and Osbert
for the other half. Osbert had also
Westmoreland, which had been held,
like York, by Ranulf Glanvill.

8 Rot. Pip. 4 Ric. I. :— ' Ricardus
Malebysse reddit computum de xx
marcis pro rehabenda terra sua usque
ad adventum domini regis, quse seisita
fuit in manu regis propter occisionem
Judseorum Eboraci ; et ut ipse et
Walterus de Carton et Ricardus de
Kukeneia, armigeri ejus, habeant
pacem regis usque ad adventum ejus.'
Madox, 334. Also William de Percy,

and punishes
the knights

The punish-
ment falls
heavily on
the adhe-
rents of the
bishop of
Durham

knight, and Picot, Roger de Ripun and
Alan Malekake ' debent v marcas pro
eodem." These are probably nominal
compositions made after Longchamp's
deposition. Richard Malebysse, the
ancestor of the Yorkshire clan of
Beckwith, is called nephew of Agnes
Percy in a charter of Sallay ; Mon.
Angl. vi. 513. Picot is a family name
among the Percies ; Mon. Angl. vi.
93. Picot the sheriff was grandfather
of William Percy, whose charter is
attested by Henry de Puiset. Alan
Malekake and Picot de Percy are found
attesting a grant of Henry de Puiset
to the monastery at Bakestanforde, in
Raine's Priory of Finchale, p. 10, and
Henry de Puiset and Richard Male-
bysse sign another together, p. 15.
On the other hand, the Fauconbergs
and Cukeneys were closely connected
and were fellow benefactors of Wei-
beck ; Mon. Angl. vi. 873. Marmaduke
Darrell also attests a charter of Wil-
liam Percy ; Mon. Angl. vi. 1190. I
should not like to accuse the Puiset
and Percy connexion of a deliberate
attempt to get rid of the evidence of
their debts on this occasion, but so it
may have been. These details are not
unimportant, if we consider Roger
Hoveden's own relation to Hugh de
Puiset, and that many of these char-
ters are attested by William of Hove-
den.

220

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

Interview of
the bishops
of Durham
and Ely,
ending in
the arrest of
the former

He i- kept
uii'ior bond
at Howden

could be by the king's officers. On the same occasion the cathedral
was put under interdict and the clergy suspended, because they
declined to receive Longchamp as legate, although he had not yet
received his commission.1 It was clear to the bishop of Durham
and his friends, both in the county and in the chapter, that the
chancellor had jumped at an opportunity of infringing his jurisdiction
as justiciar, and that his sense of right had been quickened by his
desire of injuring the supporters of his rival.

As soon as the examination was over, William Longchamp set
out towards Lincoln, where he had a like work to do ; but he had
only reached Blythe,2 in Nottinghamshire, when he met Bishop Hugh
bearing his commission, and hastening to secure himself in the
territory in which he was now scarcely less than sovereign. Hugh
was not without suspicion of the chancellor's double-dealing, for in
passing through London he had presented himself to the barons
of the Exchequer and suffered a rebuff at their hands.3 Now he
delivered his credentials. Longchamp professed himself most happy
to obey the directions of the king : Hugh talked largely of his new
powers : the chancellor was more reserved. At last the commission
was read and proved to be less formidable than he expected.4 He
agreed to meet the bishop a week later at Tickhill.5 On the appointed
day he received him alone in the castle there, and, to the bishop's
disgust, produced a commission to himself dated some days later
than his rival's. Hugh felt that he had been shamefully treated,
but he had no chance of retreating. The chancellor arrested him,
and swore by the life of Richard that until the old bishop surrendered
everything that he had purchased of the king — castles, justiciarship,
earldom, and sheriffdom — he should remain a prisoner.6 In vain he
protested ; he was taken back to London and there compelled to
surrender all, and to give up, moreover, his son Henry and another
knight, Gilbert de la Leya,7 as hostages for his good behaviour. This
done, he was allowed to return northwards ; but when he reached
his manor of Howden he was stopped by the sheriff Osbert and
William Stuteville,8 and obliged to give security for residing there
during the chancellor's pleasure. He forwarded his complaints
immediately to the king, who was now at Marseilles. Richard,
thinking, perhaps, that his minister had been too zealous, and that
it was hard treatment for so old and dignified a man, wrote to

1 Ben. Pet. ii. 108, 109.
J Ben. Pet. ii. 109.
1 R. Devizes, p. 12.
4 R. Devizes, p. 13.
4 R. Devizes, p. 13.
• R. Devizes, p. 13. Benedict, ii.
109.

' Benedict, ii. 109. Gilbert de la
Leya held a fief in Craven under the
Percies, as did Henry de Puiset, Bolton
in Bolland. Whitaker, Hist. Craven,
p. 110.

" Ben. Pet. ii. 109.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN 221

Longchamp, ordering him to restore fhe manor of Sadberge and the
castle of Newcastle-on-Tyne.1 But Hugh was kept still at Howden.
The fruits of victory remained with the chancellor. He had
effectually rid himself of his chief competitor : and in this matter The barons
his appointed counsellors in the Exchequer were at one with him. chequer cou-
He saw himself at the summit of his ambition : and he now received Long-
the legatine commission from Clement III., which made him supreme treatment of
in church and state ; a letter of Eichard, from Bayonne, dated June 6, h
which was perhaps the document which had confounded Hugh de
Puiset, gave him full power to act in all things as the king's lieutenant.2

The measures which he next took were dictated partly by the Lougchamp
king and partly by his own instinct of self-defence. His brother MS hold on
Stephen accompanied the king ; but Osbert and Henry remained fortresses
with him : to Osbert he intrusted the sheriffdoms of Yorkshire and
Westmoreland — he had already received from the king the keeping
of the palace of Westminter and the prison of London.3 He himself
undertook the fortifying of the Tower, which he intrusted to one of
his dependents, William Puinctel, as constable, and on the repairs His proceed-
of which he laid out 2,8811. Is. 10d.4 On Dover Castle, which iwerand
was held by his brother-in-law, Matthew de Cleres, he expended
1.068Z. 8s. 8d., through the hands of William Maunsel.5 The ten
months which followed were the heyday of the chancellor's prosperity.
He traversed the country with a large retinue, levying contributions
from the barons as justiciar, and as legate exacting procurations
from the clergy. He was attended by a court of clerks and knights, character of
the latter anxious to connect themselves with so successful a man tratum
by marriages with his kinsfolk, and the former singing his praises
as a liberal and magnificent patron.6 It was probably at this time
that he secured for the son of Henry Longchamp the heiress of the
great family of Croun : 7 he placed in his brother's hands also

1 Hoveden, iii. 38, 39. Puinctel who captured Archbishop

2 B. de Diceto, 655. The letter of Geoffrey at Dover,
legation is dated June 5 ; that of the 5 Rot. Pip. 2 Ric. I.

king, June 6. 6 Benedict, ii. 143 ; and see Hugh

3 That is, the Fleet prison. The of Nunant's account. Hoveden, Hi.
appointment is printed in the Foedera, 142, &c.

i. 50, dated Nov. 30, 1189, Canterbury. 7 William, son of Henry Longchamp,
That the prison in question was that married Petronilla, daughter of Guy de
' de Ponte de Fliet ' appears from an Croun, and got through her large
entry in the Pipe Roll of the 9th Ric. estates in Lincolnshire. He died
I., Madox, Hist. Exch. 356. Osbert before 1207, and she afterwards mar-
has 10Z. 12s. lid. for his trouble at ried Henry de Mara and Oliver de
Westminster and 71. 12s. Id. for the Vaux. The identity of her father-in-
charge of the gaol in 2 Ric. I. See law is established by the suit which
the Pipe Roll of that year. she and her second husband brought

4 Ben. Pet. ii. 101, 106. Rot. Pip. against the lord of Wilton for dower.
2 Ric. I. This William Puinctel is Rot. Fin, 9 John, p. 410.

doubtless a relation of Alexander

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

He strength-
en g hU poul-
lion by new
alliance,
nif the

IflfeBM

with the enrl
of Amndel
and William
ile Braiosc

Conduct of

the co-justl-
ciars

Council at
Qkramrt r

Council at
Westminster

Stephen Beauchamp, whose wardship he had purchased from Bertram
de Verdun : for another brother, Robert, he intrigued that the monks
of Westminster might choose him as their abbot.1 He made use of
his position also to strengthen himself in the good graces of his
colleagues. By a transaction which seems scarcely less than fraudu-
lent, he allowed Geoffrey FitzPeter to be received as heir, in right of
his wife, of William Mandeville, earl of Essex.8 He formed a strict
alliance with the earl of Arundel, to whom, for 2,000 marks, he
restored the honour of his earldom, which had been for sixteen years
retained in hand by the crown ; 3 and with William de Braiose 4 and
others who had the power to serve and defend his family on the
Welsh border, where the family estates lay.

The country was at peace, and only troubled with those heavy
exactions which, as being a part of Richard's necessary policy under
all his ministries, cannot be ascribed to the influence of the chan-
cellor, although they tended doubtless to make him unpopular.
Complaints from the co-justiciars that their advice was systematically
neglected are said to have been conveyed to the king; but they
continued to act with him, and Richard gave no sign of believing
them, or of a design to modify his minister's commission to please
men whom he less trusted. Longchamp found time to hold solemn
meetings of the clergy. On the 1st of August he held a council at
Gloucester, the object of which may not have been entirely eccle-
siastical, as Richard of Devizes ascribes his presence there to a wish
to besiege the castle.5 It is not clear, however, who could be holding
the castle against him. Here the bishop of Winchester met him,
and received back his patrimony, but not the purchased sheriffdom.
The reconciliation seemed to be perfect. Longchamp took the bishop's
advice in not pressing for entrance into the castle. This is the
first sign of difficulties to come. On October 18 he held a legatine
assembly at Westminster,6 in which the bishop of London sat on his

' B. Devizes, p. 34.

2 Beatrice de Say was aunt of Wil-
liam Mandeville, last earl of Essex,
and his heiress. She had two sons,
William and Geoffrey. William died,
leaving two daughters, one of whom
married Geoffrey FitzPeter. The
inheritance was disputed between this
lady and her uncle Geoffrey de Say.
Longchamp first adjudged the whole
to Geoffrey de Say, at his mother's
wish, for 7,000 marks, and gave him
seisin. There was some difficulty
about the payment, and in conse
quence the chancellor, for 3,000
marks down, transferred the barony to
Geoffrey FitzPeter. See Mon. Angl.

iv. 145, and the Pipe Boll of the 2nd
of Richard I.

1 Dugdale's Baronage, 120. This
was done by Bichard's order, dated at
Montrichard, June 27. See Feed. i. 48.

4 Gir. Carab. V. Galf. p. 896, an
affinity with William de Braiose the
younger. Can this refer to the
marriage of Walter de Lacy with Mar-
garet de Braiose, which took place a few
years later, but may have !>»•< n
arranged now ? Dugdale's Baronage,
p. 98.

5 B. Devizes, p. 13 ; B. de Diceto,
655.

• B. de Diceto, 056; B. Devizes, 14.
Gervase, 1666.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN 223

right hand and the bishop of Winchester on his left. In November,
on the 18th, he visited Canterbury and was entertained with great
honour by the monks of Christ Church.1 Little is known of the obscurity of
business transacted on these occasions. Gervase, the Canterbury atthese
Chronicler, preserves an account of a discussion relative to the council8
consecration of the bishop-elect of Worcester, and Kichard of Devizes
mentions the quarrels of the bishop and monks of Coventry as a
topic at Westminster ; but there is no trace of any important act of
constitutional policy during this time ; and the sole political move
which is mentioned is the negotiation with the King of Scots,
carried on, doubtless, with Kichard's sanction, for the recognition of
Arthur of Brittany as heir in case of the king's dying childless.2
The charters of towns granted so freely by Richard at a later period,
which form the mark of his reign on domestic history, are scarce
under this administration ; 3 and although the chancellor acted as
judge in the courts both in London and in the country, there is no
trace of any improvement introduced by him, such as had distinguished
year after year the rule of his predecessor.

The few notices we have of his acts during this period show that L°n&- )g
he was in constant progress, and confirm the statements of the rapid move-
historians as to the burden of entertaining him. A visit of a single 1190
night cost the house which received him three years' savings.4 He
entertained a train of a thousand horsemen.5 He moved through
the kingdom, Richard of Devizes says, like a flash of lightning.6
Unhappily, the collection of revenue to satisfy the ever-increasing Hisoccupa-
demands of Richard seems to have been his principal occupation.

So the year 1190 ends. Early in 1191 we find him at Northamp-
ton witnessing, with the other judges of the Curia, a final concord
between the abbot of Peterborough and one Roger de Torpel, relative
to the advowson of the church of Maxey.7 This seems to have been
about the last peaceful transaction in which he was engaged.

His misfortunes came upon him all at once. Complaints had complaint*
been carried to Richard, who was now at Messina, in unbroken sue- to Richard
cession, and he had refused to listen ; now the queen-mother herself
undertook the task of remonstrance. She started on her journey to
Sicily in February ; 8 one part of her errand was to forward the

1 Gervase, 1566. 7 Mon. Angl. i. 391 :— ' Coram W.

- Will. Newb. iv. 14. Elyensi episcopo, domini regis can-

3 One to Winchester is printed in cellario, et Willelmo Comite Arundel
the Fcedera, i. 50, 51, dated at Nonan- et W. Marescallo, Galfrido filio Petri,
court, March 14, 1190. Hugone Bardulf, W. Briwerre, Simone

4 Bened. ii. 143. de Pateshill, Roberto de Whitefeld,

5 Will. Newb. iv. 14. 'Procedebat justitiis domini regis.' Thursday
cum mille equis.' after S. Vincent's day, i.e. Jan. 24.

6 R. Devizes, p. 14, ' in similitu- H R. de Diceto, 654.
din em fulguris coruscantis.'

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVE DEN

Vacancy of
the Me of
Canterbury

Eleanor's
Ttrft to
Sicily

John begins
to move
John had
tasted the
sweets of
power

Hi? court
and minis-
ters

His wealth
and magnifi-
cence

consecration of the archbishop of York. The same month brought
from Messina the news of the death of the archbishop of Canterbury.1
As soon as the two metropolitan sees should be filled up, the legatine
power would almost to a certainty be withdrawn from the bishop of
Ely, and with it a large part of the influence which made him for
the time invulnerable.

But Eleanor's journey to Messina seems to have had another
more speedy and more fatal consequence. Unfortunately the want
of exact dates prevents us from ascertaining the period of John's
return to England ; but if it was before February 1191, his mother's
influence, whilst she was within reach, must have kept him within
bounds. As soon as she departs, we find him in active mischief.

John was not inclined to wait for his succession ; the foolish
policy of Richard in attempting to conciliate by the gift of real
power an enemy whom he knew to be faithless and whose weakness
of character he despised too much for his own safety, had given John
a taste, too tempting by far, of substantial sovereignty. After he had
returned to England he set up his own court in the castles which
had been given him, with scarcely less than royal pretension. He
had his own justiciar, Roger de Plasnes,2 lord of Eastthorpe and
Birch in Essex ; his chancellor, Stephen Ridell,3 afterwards arch-
deacon of Ely and always a thorn in Longchamp's side ; a member
of one of the great ministerial houses of Henry. I.'s reign, nephew to
the archbishop of Canterbury : his seal bearer was Master Benedict,4
probably the same who became in after years the bishop of Rochester ;
William of Kahannes was his seneschal ; * Theobald Walter his
butler.6 With these ministers he taxed and judged the tenants of
his estates and the inhabitants of his franchises. The counties under
his control were administered by his own sheriffs, and their revenues
were a loss to the exchequer of the king. Extravagant as he was, he
was rich enough to dispense with the oppressive measures taken by
the chancellor ; his magnificence made him popular, and his court

1 The letters containing the news
are given in the Epp. Cantuar. pp.
329, 330 ; one of them dated Messina,
Jan. 25.

» R. de Diceto, 664.

1 Ben. Pet. ii. 224. Ang. Sac. i.
634. Longchamp deprived him of his
preferments after Richard's return,
Gir. Camb. V. Galf. 404. The date of
his appointment to the archdeaconry is
not settled, but it was probably after
this. He was many years later the
papal candidate for the see of Ely. A
letter from the pope's chamberlain,
Stephen, to John is in existence,

asking for his promotion. 4th Report
of the Deputy-Keeper of the Records,
App. ii. p. 141. This must have been
in 1215. He died before the see was
filled up.

4 Ben. Pet. ii. 224.

* Foedern, i. 55.

1 Foedera, i. 65. This is the bro-
ther of Hubert Walter, chief butler to
John as Lord of Ireland, and ancestor
of the Butlers of Ormond. He was
also constable of Lancaster castle, and
fermer of the honour. Madox, Hist.
Exch. 412.

THE CHKONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN 225

became the headquarters of all who had grounds of complaint against
Longchamp. He lived at Lancaster, where Theobald Walter was his He waits for
castellan, or at Marlborough, and waited for a chance of supplanting tunity
the minister. The leading man in his counsels was Hugh of Nunant, Hugh of
bishop of Coventry, who, much as he hated Longchamp, had not ohief ad- 1S
yet quarrelled with him. John himself, until the outbreak, seems
to have been on good terms with him, and it was from him as
legate that he had received absolution from his vow of absence from
England for three years.1

Hugh of Nunant was sprung from a family the head of which character

tim 1 c&rccr

held the barony of Totness by gift of King William Rufus. He of Hugh of
was sister's son and adopted child of Arnulf of Lisieux,2 the
pertinacious schemer of Henry II.' s reign, and had inherited from
him the diplomatic abilities of his race. He had travelled and
negotiated, and under Henry II. had been ambassador to Frederick I.
and Alexander III.3 He had tried his hand also at the work of a
legate ; had been sent in that capacity to Ireland for John's corona-
tion, in 1187 ; 4 and on his way had insulted the church of
Canterbury by carrying a cross and wearing a mitre whilst yet
unconsecrated, in the presence of Archbishop Baldwin. Since his
consecration, on the other hand, his aim had been to play the part of
a temporal lord ; he had bought, as we have seen, the sheriffdoms in
three counties. He was possessed with an extreme hatred of
monachism, which was amply repaid by the monks. He was a
thoroughly unprincipled man ; very vain and ambitious ; clever,
eloquent, a'nd adroit, but jealous of all pre-eminence and unscrupulous
in word and deed. Gervase of Canterbury, with some discrimination,
represents him as an able and spirited man of business ; captious in
word ; ready to curse when a curse would frighten ; apt enough with
soft words where the object was to subvert the strong.5 I have
already referred to him as the author of the vile charges brought by
Giraldus against Longchamp. If the monks might be believed, his
own character was no better. It was said that when, lying on his HIS death-
death-bed, he recounted the sins of his life, he found no confessor sion and
who would venture to appoint him a penance.6 Giraldus 7 adduces repen
this as a proof of the greatness of his penitence ; but the story
proceeds to say that he sentenced himself to purgatory until the day
of judgment. It was he who advised Richard to send the monks to
the devil ; ' devils ' was the best name he ever found for the fraternity ;
and the great object of his episcopal policy was to substitute for them

1 Gir. Camb. De Rebus a se gestis ; 5 Gervase, 1487.

Ang. Sac. ii. 496. 6 M. Paris, 192 ; Chron. de Melsa,

• Arn. Lexov. ep. cxxvii. i. 249, from Higden.

3 Ben. Pet. i. 322. ' Gir. Camb. De Vita H. Nonant ;

4 Ben. Pet. ii. 4 ; Gervase, 1486. Ang. Sac. ii. 353, 354.

Q

226

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVE DEN

Hi- qnarrel
with the
monks

Longchamp
Ht first con-
nives at big
treatment of
the monks
for n time

Causes of
John's hos-
tility to
Longcbamp

The proba-
bility of
Arthur's

- ic ••--!.. i,

canons, not only at Coventry but in the other conventual cathedrals.
The whole details of his contest with his own monks, which was as
long and lively as that of the archbishop with those of Christ Church,
are not preserved ; but it is not unlikely that part at least of his
hatred of Longchamp was caused by the conduct of the latter in this
respect. Longchamp was a favourite with the monks, and possibly
exerted himself on their behalf with a view to the promotion of his
brother Robert. Before Baldwin's departure, in a council at West-
minster on October 22, 1189,1 Hugh had shown himself to the bishops
black and blue with the blows the monks had given him ; and
Baldwin, whose feelings were easily excited, and who had no love of
monks who were not Cistercians, had joined in a sentence of
excommunication against the assailants. The chancellor had so far
yielded to the same pressure as to order, in the council at Westminster
in October 1190,2 the removal of the monks ; but it is probable that
he hesitated to sanction the oppressive means by which the change
was carried out, or that, when the see of Canterbury became vacant,
he adopted the more promising policy. Whether Hugh had kept
terms with him until he gained his object, or had quarrelled with
him on the subject, does not appear ; but now the close friendship
which the world had seen between the two bishops broke up suddenly/
and Hugh of Nunant became the intimate friend of John.

Subsequent events showed the line of argument by which John's
fears and mistrust of the chancellor were aroused. Richard whilst
at home had avoided any recognition of John as his heir, and the
very liberality with which he had dealt with him was clogged with
restrictions that showed his mistrust. The prospect of the succession
of Arthur was intolerable ; yet it was understood that that was a
settled thing between Richard and his minister. The king had, in
the November just past, arranged for a marriage between Arthur
and a daughter of King Tancred, and had written to the pope about
Arthur as his heir.4 Possibly the news of this negotiation may have
prompted Eleanor's visit to her elder son, and her anxiety for his
speedy marriage. She cared little for Arthur, and her love for John
probably made her desirous that his state of suspense should be
terminated by the birth of a direct heir. In pursuance of the king's
plan, Longchamp had negotiated with William the Lion,5 who was
the nearest kinsman, on the side of his mother, to the young duke.
Besides, the vacancy of the see of Canterbury laid open to the legate
the highest constitutional position in the realm : if Richard were to
die on the crusade, there could be no doubt whose voice would be
most potent in the nomination of his successor ; there could be no

1 R. Devizes, p. 9.
4 Ben. Pet. ii. 137.

* R. Devizes, p. 14.
Hoveden, iii. 65.

1 Will. Newb., iv. 18.
» Will. Newb., iv. 14.

THE CHRONICLE OF EOGEE OF HOVEDEN 227

doubt either that the chancellor was tampering with the monks to The proba-
obtain the election for himself. The bishops as a body were sure to Lonfchamp
accept the king's nominee, and the king was certain to nominate the archbishop
chancellor ; the monks, who alone could impede or delay such a influence of
consummation, were being prepared to look to him as their protector ; bishop in
he would soon be archbishop ; then John's chance of the crown nationontie
would be gone. Richard's object in nominating the archbishop of tolh?5'0"
Montreal ' could only be guessed. It might be that he had sold ki"gj°m
the appointment, or that he had sold the promise ; or that he
merely wished to waste time and shut out other competitors. It
could be scarcely thought that he intended the nomination to
be sustained. In the meantime some blow must be struck that
would disgrace or disable Longchamp ; nor would it be difficult
to find an occasion. He had offended all classes and all parts Longchamp
of England by his exactions, his arrogance, and his contempt for au^uuses1^
the nation at large. He had rejected the advice of John himself,
had virtually imprisoned his fellow justiciar the bishop of Durham ; he
had shown a provoking disregard of the counsel of the barons whom
Richard had associated with him in the regency. There is so much
truth unquestionably in these accusations that we cannot be surprised
that John acted upon them. And an opportunity soon presented itself.

The immediate cause of the outbreak was this : — Gerard Camville, Behaviour
son of that Richard who commanded the English fleet on the crusade
and was afterwards viceroy of Cyprus, had married Nicolaa of Hay,
the heiress of the castellanship of Lincoln, and shortly before the
king's departure had bought the sheriffdom of Lincolnshire, with a
promise of seven hundred marks. The impolicy of allowing the
sheriff's jurisdiction and the possession of the castle to be in the
same hands was an admitted principle of administration ; even John
himself had not been suffered to hold both castles and provincial
jurisdictions together: but Gerard Camville's position was not in He
itself illegal. He had, however, allowed his castle to become a den jo
of robbers, and then, to avoid judicial inquiries, had done homage to £^,
John.2 On hearing of this, the chancellor ordered him to give up
both castle and sheriffdom. This he refused to do and prepared for
resistance. Nearly at the same time Roger Mortimer, lord of
Wigraore, got into difficulties with the government and held his
castle against the chancellor's men.3

1 See below, p. 329. * R. Devizes, p. 30. The charge

2 R. Devizes, p. 30 ; Will. Newb. against Roger was that he was con-
iv. 16. Hoveden; iii. 242 :— ' retatus triving rebellion against the king with
fuit de receptatione prsedonum : ' the the Welsh. I believe this fact is
sum of the charges only appears after noticed by no other writer than
the king's return, when they were Richard.

heard before him at Nottingham.

Q.2

•22S

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

Interview

John and
Longchamp
(March SI,
1191)

John pete
possession of
TickhiU and
Nottingham
castle*.

Treachery
of the

constables

champ'g
first discom
fiture.

Arbitration
at Winches-
ter (April
28,1191)

It is impossible to say whether the interview which was held
between John and Longchamp on Mid-Lent Sunday at Winchester
preceded or followed this outbreak of revolt.1 But it is certain that
an estrangement had by this time taken place, and that the two had
then and there a serious discussion as to the tenure of certain castles
belonging to the honours which John enjoyed, that were yet with-
held from him, and as to the pensions settled upon him out of the
exchequer. Unless, however, events followed very rapidly, we may
place the revolt of Lincoln after this meeting ; and it was probably
a result of it. If John had not quarrelled with Longchamp, Gerard
Camville would not have dared to put himself into his power on the
chance of being protected. The interview certainly settled nothing,
and John, for once in his life prompt to action, hastened to the
north. Longchamp had to go first to Wigmore ; long before he could
reach Lincoln the castle was in a state of defence, and, worse still,
the castles of Tickhill and Nottingham, which had been purposely
withheld from John, had been surprised by him.8 John de Lacy, the
constable of Chester, who had undertaken to hold them for the chan-
cellor, had intrusted them to Robert of Croxton and Eudo Deiville,
and had gone to the crusade, during which he died at Tyre.3 Roger,
his son, had placed two other knights as companions of these two,
and all four had turned traitors. John won the first move of
the game, and when Longchamp arrived in Lincolnshire, after
taking Wigmore and sentencing Roger Mortimer to three years of
exile,4 he found his forces weary and an attack impossible. At the
same time two other pieces of news reached him.5 Clement III.
was dead, and his legation would require the confirmation of the new
pope ; and Walter of Coutances, archbishop of Rouen, the trusted
minister of Henry II., who had accompanied Richard to Messina»
was returning to England with unknown instructions. A proposal
for pacification was only too welcome : the legate returned to
Winchester, and there, on the 25th of April, an agreement was
drawn up for an arbitration.

The management of this was intrusted to three bishops, Win-
chester, London, and Bath. The bishops summoned three barons
to represent each side : for the chancellor, the earls of Warren,
Arundel, and Clare; for John, his chancellor, Stephen Ridell,
William of Wenneval, and Reginald of Wasseville ; and in addition
to these each party chose eight other knights. The choice of the
three earls — old Hamelin of Warren, the brother of Henry II. ;

1 R. Devizes, p. 26.

1 Hoveden, iii. 134.

207. Will. Newb. iv.

vi /.* . p. 30.

' Ben. Pet. ii. 232. Hoveden, iii. 172.
Benedict, ii. ' R. Devizes, p. 30.

16. R. De- » Will. Newb. |iv. 16 (ed. Hamil-
ton, p. 46).

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGEK OF HOVEDEN 229

William of Albini, son of Queen Adeliza, and his stepson Richard
of Clare — shows that the chancellor's position still recommended
itself to those who might be supposed to have the king's interest
most at heart. They had been among the most faithful friends of Articles of
Henry II. ; John's representatives, on the contrary, were three of his
own creatures. Both parties swore to act fairly, and the arbitration
was pronounced, as follows : — Gerard Camville is reconciled with
the chancellor and allowed to retain the castle of Lincoln. John is
formally to restore the castles of Tickhill and Nottingham, but the
chancellor is to intrust the command of them to Eichard of Wasse-
ville and William of Wenneval, liegemen of the king, but partisans
of John ; each of whom is to give security for the surrender of them
to the king, if he shall return ; if not, to John. As for the other
castles belonging to the honours of John, the chancellor is to change
the wardens if John can show due cause for such a measure. In
case of the king's death the chancellor is to do his best to secure the
succession for John. All the articles, it will be seen, are decided in
favour of John — a proof either that his cause was regarded as IK practical
superior, or that the chancellor's fortunes were sinking in the esti-
mation of his friends ; for the two main points of his policy, so
far as we can discover, were the maintenance of the king's hold
on the castles and of the succession of Arthur.1 Two days after
the pacification, the archbishop of Rouen landed at Shoreham,
furnished with a batch of instructions from the king.2

Walter of Coutances, 'the Pilate of Rouen," 3 was a man of fair Arrival of
abilities, noble birth,4 sound religious character, and great experience, cou'tauc'es
He was, however, somewhat wanting in resolution, and scarcely instructions
strong enough to be intrusted with the almost unlimited discretion Ikhard to
with which Richard accredited him. He left Messina with Queen ™teucL
Eleanor on the 2nd of April,5 glad to escape, by the sacrifice of his
treasure, the further perils of the crusade. Richard, in a characteristic
way, although in the utmost need of his services, made him pay
heavily for the relaxation of his vow.6 But hastily as he had made
his way home, his commissions were dated as far back as the 23rd
of February.7 It would seem that the king had not been able to
make up his mind to discard the chancellor until the arrival of

1 R. Devizes, pp. 32, 33. See also 4 Gir. Camb. V. Galfr. ii. 10, p.
the notes to Benedict, ii. 208. Hove- 399 : ' Galterius iste ab antiqua et
den, iii. 135. authenticaBritonumprosapiaTrojanse

2 R. de Diceto, 659. Gervase places nobilitatis apicem prseferente originem
the arrival of the archbishop two trahens.'

months later, about midsummer, c. 5 Itin. R. R. 176 ; Hoveden, iii. 100 ;

1571. Ben. Pet. ii. 158, 161.

3 This is the name given him by 6 R. Devizes, p. 27.
Longchamp after his deposition ; Ben. ; R. de Diceto, 659 ; Gir. Camb. V.
Pet. ii. 224 ; Hoveden ; iii. 155. Galfr. p. 396.

280

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

Richard's

curious

vacillation

State of
affairs on
the arch-
btahop'a

arrivnl

Probable
reason for
his not
acting

Longchamp
prepares for
a second

struggle

Eleanor ; and that even when, in consequence, we may suppose, of
her representations, he at last confided the instructions to the arch-
bishop, it must have been with a verbal command to use them as
the occasion might seem to warrant. Unless there were some such
private direction the conduct of the archbishop is inexplicable.
He was far too honest a man to conceal an order given peremptorily
by the king ; unquestionably his mission was in the first place to
investigate, although after investigation he had full power to act.
It must, however, be considered that Richard's conduct was puzzling
to all parties ; at the very moment he was intrusting the widest
powers to the archbishop, he was writing to urge John and others to
act in unison with the chancellor.1 On his arrival he found that
John had gained a decided advantage over the chancellor, and that
to produce the letters which superseded the latter would be to throw
all power into the hands of the man whom his master most
reasonably distrusted.3 He saw also, it seems likely, that the
humiliation ;which Longchamp had gone through would be enough
to cut him off from the hope of the primacy, and his legation had
already expired. John was at the moment the more dangerous
of the two, and Longchamp's authority must be sustained.

The chancellor, on the other hand, finding that the archbishop
produced no new instructions, and that the mercenary force which
he had introduced into the country was daily increasing,3 took heart
and prepared for another struggle. Before attempting this, however,
he had to visit Canterbury, where the bishop-elect of Worcester was
waiting for consecration. There on May 5 he met the bishops of

1 R. Devizes, 29. This may account
for his hesitation in acting. Long-
champ had utterly foiled the bishop of
Durham by producing instructions of
later date than his own. Walter of
Coutances' letters were dated in
February. Many letters of later date
must have reached England before
the end of April ; and these were
favourable to the chancellor.

* The letters subsequently produced
by the archbishop are given in part or
entire by R. de Diceto and Oiraldus
Cambrensis. Of these, one is a frag-
ment of a letter addressed to William
Marshall, Hugh Bardulf, Geoffrey
FitzPeter and William Briewere ;
placing in their hands the supreme
power, in case the chancellor shall
have not acted faithfully ; it is not
dated and contains no mention of the
archbishop. R. de Diceto, 059. A
second, also given by R. de Diceto,
is dated Feb. 23 at Messina, addressed

to the chancellor and the four barons
above mentioned, associating the
archbishop in the government of the
kingdom, and speaking of an especial
commission given to him relative to
the see of Canterbury. A third, dated
Feb. 20, and addressed to William
Marshall alone, contains words
nearly identical with those of K. de
Diceto's first fragment, but directing
that, in case of the chancellor's un-
faithfulness, the justices are to act
' secundum preedicti archiepiscopi dis-
positionem.' Richard of Devizes
mentions other instructions, no doubt
addressed to the convent of Canterbury,
and one in particular giving Long-
champ leave to manage by himself
the election to the abbacy of West-
minster. R. Dev. p. 29. See notes
on Benedict, ii. 157, 158 ; Hoveden, iiL
96.
1 W. Newb. iv. 16, p. 46.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEX 231

Winchester, Bath, Chichester, and Rochester,1 and his great enemy
Hugh of Nunant ; and by these the consecration was performed. On
the following day the legate, for so he still called himself, presented He visits
to the monks of Christ Church the king's letters, recommending c
them to elect the archbishop of Montreal.2 The monks expressed
surprise at the urgency of the legate's behaviour, and asked leave to Long-
present their answer to the council of bishops which was to sit a few transitions
days later at Northampton. The permission was granted by Long- monks'1^
champ readily enough, for although he might have preferred the Canterbury
election of a stranger to the translation of any of his brethren, he
was better pleased that the archbishopric should be vacant still. It
is to be suspected that on this occasion there was some underhand
dealing between Longchamp and the monks, for immediately on the
departure of the legate 3 they displaced their prior, Osbert, whom
Baldwin had appointed against their will, an act for which they were
never called to order by Longchamp : from this moment also the Fear of ins
idea recovered ground that he himself intended to be the new arch- archbishoir
bishop. The report reached John, who wrote urgently against him
to the convent,4 and the archbishop of Rouen allowed so much of
his instructions to transpire that it was known that one part of them
at least was to settle the business of the election.

The meeting at Northampton followed shortly,5 and a further successive
postponement of the election. The monks required further evidence rants of the
of Baldwin's death and of the qualifications of the aspirant. The
justices urged that the election should be proceeded with instantly,
but the monks as usual contrived to gain their point, this time
probably with the direct support of the chancellor.

Shortly after this arrangement was made, the hostilities between Hostilities
the chancellor and Gerard Camville were resumed. Immediately
after midsummer,0 having taken measures to secure his reappoint-
ment as legate, one of which was the forwarding of urgent letters in
his favour from the bishops and from Walter of Coutances among
them,8 he brought together his forces and again advanced on Lincoln, Longchamp
this time taking permanent possession of the sheriffdom, which he agaiLT
handed over to William Stuteville.8 The castle, however, still held Lilloohl
out, and on the first report of the chancellor's march the garrisons
of Tickhill and -Nottingham, as might be expected, opened their gates

1 Gervase, 1568. tinctly : ' omnes Anglican! episcopi pro

2 Gervase, 1569. See below, p. 329. eodem legationis officio confirmando

3 Gervase, 1570. mihi proprias litteras transmiserunt.'

4 Epp. Cantuar. 330, 346. Ben. Pet. ii. 242, 243 ; Hoveden, iii.
8 Gervase, 1570. 190.

8 ' Post festum Sancti Johannis 8 Hoveden, iii. 134 ; Ben. Pet. ii.

Baptists.' Ben. Pet. ii. 207. 207.

7 So Pope Celestine III. states dis-

282

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

Second paci-
fication at
Winchf>tor

Result of
he second

arbitration

Sureties on
ijoth titles

Influence of
the arch-
bishop of
Rouen

to John. But again both parties avoided a battle, although Long-
champ had called up a third of the feudal levy of England for his
defence.1 The moderate counsels of the archbishop of Rouen
prevailed, and at another conference, at Winchester on July 28, a
somewhat fairer arbitration was arranged.3 In this the bishop of
Durham also took part, having, it would seem, been liberated from
his forced inactivity by the arrival of Walter of Coutances ; and
besides the three who had arbitrated in April, the bishops of Coventry
and Chichester were present. Preserving in some measure the lines
of the former agreement, they decided that John was to place Tickhill
in the hands of William of Wenneval,3 and Nottingham in those of
William Marshall, to be held by them for the king, but in the event
of his death, or of a further attack on John by the chancellor, to be
surrendered to the former. The other castles of John's honours are
intrusted to the archbishop of Rouen, the bishop of London, and
others, to be surrendered to him in case of the king's death. The
castle of Windsor is handed over to the earl of Arundel, Winchester
to Gilbert de Lacy,4 and Northampton to Simon Pateshull, all
partisans of the chancellor. Ge-ard Camville is to be replaced in
the sheriffdom. In all these points the chancellor gave way some-
what more than was wise, but less than he had done in April. When
these arrangements should be completed, the complaints of the
chancellor against Gerard Camville were to be heard and John was
bound not to interfere. Oaths were taken on both sides, for Long-
champ, by the earls of Arundel, Salisbury, Norfolk, and Clare,
William FitzRobert, William de Braiose, and Roger Fit/. Rainf mi :
for John, by his chancellor Stephen Ridell, William of Wenneval,
Robert de Mara, Philip of Worcester, William of Kahannes, Gilbert
Basset, and William of Montacute. Among Longchamp's jurors
were some who very shortly showed themselves to be his enemies,
especially the earl of Salisbury and Roger FitzRainfrai.5 It is
possible that his interests were intentionally betrayed, and it was
certainly a puerile piece of lawyer's work to pretend to regard the
main question as one between Gerard Camville and the chancellor.
But the archbishop of Rouen probably sacrificed other considerations
to the maintenance of his own position as mediator, and to the
obtaining the omission of any terms which would have openly asserted
John's claim to the succession.

1 R. Devizes, 32.

* Hoveden, iii. 135.

1 He bad held Nottingham under
the earlier treaty (R. Devizes, 33), and
he was constable there again in 1194.
Hoveden, iii. 240.

4 Another of the numerous proofs
of the connexion of Longchamp with

the Lacies ; as indeed was the fact
that he intrusted Nottingham and
Tickhill to the constable of Cheater
(above, p. 228).

* These were both excommunicated
by him after his exile. Ben. Pet. ii.
223; Hoveden, iii. 153.

THE CHEONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN 238

After the party broke up the chancellor returned to London,1 and Break-up
John removed to Marlborough,2 whence a little later he went to conference
Lancaster.3 The archbishop of Eouen now again attempted to carry
out the king's directions as to the election at Canterbury, but was
met by a positive prohibition from Longchamp.4

Another cloud was rising, not now in the distance. After two Return of
years of struggling, the archbishop- elect of York had received per- archbishop
mission and an order to be consecrated by the archbishop of Tours.5
Immediately on his consecration, urged by John and perhaps not
discountenanced by Eleanor,6 he gave out that he was determined to
proceed to his see, and that he, as well as John, had been allowed by
their brother to withdraw his promise to absent himself for three
years from England. The chancellor had received no such instruc-
tions ; it was his duty to prevent his return, or at least to compel
him to swear fealty to the king : as early as July 30,7 he had ordered
the sheriff of Sussex to arrest him if he should attempt to land within
his jurisdiction,8 and about the same time had obtained a promise Precautions
from the countesses of Boulogne and Flanders to forbid his embarka- cimmpg
tion. Having satisfied himself with these precautions he moved
northwards, and having visited probably Ely and S. Edmund's,9 he
is next found at Norwich.10

Geoffrey Plantagenet, the eldest surviving son, if not the first-born character of
of Henry II.,11 is not, like William Longchamp and Hugh of Nunant, a
man of whom his contemporaries could deliver contradictory characters.
His virtues and faults are clearly the same in the mouths of friends
and enemies. His faithfulness to his father when his legitimate
children had forsaken him is no recommendation to those who hated

1 Two days after the pacification, opportunity of damaging Longchamp
July 30, the chancellor writes from and strengthening his own position.
Preston to the sheriff of Sussex to ' Gir. Camb. V. Galfr. p. 390 ; R.
secure Geoffrey of York. Gir. Camb. de Diceto, 660.

V. Galfr. p. 390. On the 2nd of 8 Ibid.

August he writes to the bishop of Bath " Jocelin of Brakelond mentions his

from the Tower of London ; ' teste visit to S. Edmund's, which it is diffi-

Radulfo archidiacono Herefordiro.' cuit to place at any earlier period after

2 Hence he dates his letter to the the date of his legation.
monks of Canterbury against the 10 Gir. Camb. V. Galfr. p. 392.
chancellor. Epp. Cantuar. 346. " He was born in 1151, if Giraldus

3 Gir. Camb. V. Galfr. p. 393. is right in stating that he was forty at

4 R. de Diceto, 660, 661 ; Gir. Camb. the time of his consecration. V. Galfr.
395. The letter is dated August 25, p. 388. He must have been born,
' apud Releiam.' therefore, six years before Richard.

5 Gir. Camb. V. Galfr. p. 388. If his mother were indeed Fair Rosa-

6 Benedict, ii. 210. I cannot go so mond, who is described as a girl in
far as to say that Geoffrey's visit was 1176, she must have been the king's
the result of a deliberate plot on John's mistress for six-and-twenty years, and
behalf, any more than the revolt of he must be credited with constancy at
Gerard Camville had been ; but in least. See Ben. Pet. ii. pref. xxxi.
both cases he grasped with avidity the

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

Ji is strange

ambition

His many
enemies and
rivals for
power

his father, but it is not less a virtue. His skill in arms, his energy,
his high and generous spirit, are apparent even when adduced as an
argument of his unfitness for high spiritual office. His secular
ambition calls for the animadversions both of his rivals and of those
who would condemn such a feeling in an ecclesiastic altogether,
neither choosing to remember that his ecclesiastical character wan
forced upon him. He had been for many years the close companion
of his father as chancellor, and it was Henry's last expressed wish
that he should be archbishop of York ; probably he saw that in such
a character only would his life be safe against his brothers, or any
share of the power which he had enjoyed so long remain to him.
His own ambition, Giraldus tells us, pointed l another way : to his
chance of surviving his childless brothers and becoming king of
England. The idea is so strange that we might almost suspect that
Giraldus did not invent it. Such a thought, however, explains in
some measure the conduct of both Geoffrey and Richard. The king
was anxious to have him ordained, as the tonsure would be a bar to
the crown ; Geoffrey held back from ordination himself, as he had
done before when elected to the see of Lincoln ; nor did he receive
consecration until he had seen both Richard and John married. But
on Giraldus's word alone it cannot be taken for truth, and there were
plenty of people whose interests were concerned in hindering his
acquisition of the full rights of his position. Hugh de Puiset had
no wish to be placed under an ecclesiastical superior from whom,
although he had by papal privilege obtained the right of refusing
him formal submission,2 he might look for constant canonical as well
as constitutional interference. Richard was anxious, for a long time
at least, to keep Geoffrey out of England, and to retain in the hands
of the Exchequer the great revenues of the see of York. The chapter
of York was filled with turbulent and secular men, a large proportion
of whom Geoffrey had offended immediately after his election by
refusing to confirm their titles. These were in constant strife with
him before and after his consecration, and during the whole of his
pontificate, misinterpreting and perverting every action of his, and
catching at every chance which his undeniable talent for quarrelling
with everyone gave them of attempting his deposition. John could
have nothing in common with Geoffrey, although he anxiously pressed
upon him his duty of taking charge of his church, with the intention,
no doubt, of preparing fresh difficulties for the chancellor. William
Longchamp seems to have been fully persuaded that the king had

1 ' Sperabat enim si de rege fratre
suo in peregrinatione tarn periculcsa
quicquid forte sinistre contigerit, se
regnum universun et regni partem non

modicam assecuturum.' Gir. Catnb.
V. G. p. 383.

1 Ben. Pet. ii. 146 ; Hoveden, iii.
74.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN 235

made no concession in respect of the oath, and that he was perfectly
justified in forbidding his return. He might, however, have seen
that Geoffrey, if he could make him a friend, would be a counterpoise
to John in the north of England.

It was probably the news brought from England by Eleanor that Kicanor's
induced Richard to stir at last in the matter ; he saw, perhaps, that used 1"°'
Geoffrey might be harmless, or even useful in the case of a struggle fa™urC> '
between the bishops of Durham and Ely. Eleanor, on her visit to
Rome, laid the circumstances before Pope Celestine ; v all difficulties Geoffrey's
were obviated ; the letters of Clement III., by which Hugh de Puiset tion
was authorised to refuse the profession of obedience, were set aside ;
and the archbishop of Tours, Bartholomew of Vendome, under whose
eye Geoffrey had studied in the schools,2 was ordered to consecrate
him. This was done on the 18th of August ; the same day he
received the pall, and immediately set out for England. On his

arrival at Guisnes" he learned that the countess of Flanders had He is for-
bidden to

forbidden her men to convey him across the straits, and that the <*aii to Eug-
countess of Boulogne had done the same at Whitsand. On remon-
strating, however, he was told that the prohibition extended only to
him personally, that the Whitsand boatmen would carry his equipage,
and that he might cross in an English vessel. The hint was taken ;
the retinue, under Simon of Apulia, crossed in Flemish vessels on
Friday the 13th of September ; 4 Geoffrey followed in an English He crosses
boat and reached Dover on the following day about nine in the and an '
morning. The authorities were prepared for him ; before he had arrestPkim is
time to land, the messengers of the lady of the castle, Richenda, the ma(le
chancellor's sister, boarded the vessel, and insisted on his proceeding
straight to the castle, where the day before his baggage had been de-
posited. Geoffrey declined the invitation, hastily disguised himself,5
and mounting the horse which was prepared for him on the beach, He takes
started at full speed for the priory of S. Martin. One of Richenda's s. Martin's
men rode after him, and caught the horse by the bridle ; but Geoffrey

1 Hoveden, iii. 100. It was pro- obstante, et ante consecrationem et

bubly a result of this intercession of cum fueris consecratus assistat . . .

Eleanor that Celestine III. on the et . . . debitam tibi obedientiam et

llth of May issued the letter to reverentiam, sublato cujuslibet contra-

Geoffrey which is printed in the Mon. dictionis et appellationis obstaculo,

Angl. vi. 1188, and contains the fol- impendere non postponat.' The letter

lowing statement : ' quod licet per- is printed unintelligibly in the Mo-

sonam venerabilis fratris nostri nasticon.

Hugonis Dunelmensis episcopi ... 2 Benedict, i. 93.

sedes apostolica provident et duxerit 3 Gir. Camb. V. Galfr. p. 390.

honorandum, quia tamen juri et statui Benedict, ii. 210.

Eboracensis ecclesise nos oportuit et * Gir. Camb. V. Galfr. p. 390.

decuit providere . . . ei dedimus in 5 ' Mutavit vestes.' Benedict, ii.

mandalis atque prsecepimus, tibi sicut 210. Hoveden, iii. 138. Giraldus

suo metropolitano, exemptione qualibet does not mention this undignified act

obtenta pro eo a Eomana ecclesia non of his hero.

'286

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVKDEX

Nefrotlations
with the
lady of the
castle

Geoffrey re-
faMs to
swear fealty

Geoffrey ex-
communi-
cates his
enemies

He it takeu
from 6. Mar-
tin's to the
castle

Public ex-
citement at
the news

was equal to the occasion, struck out with his right leg, and hit his
adversary's horse full on the side with his armed heel. The horse
plunged, and compelled the rider to relax his hold.1 The archbishop,
after this exploit, proceeded unmolested to the priory, where he found
the monks beginning mass ; the epistle was being read : the words
(so the story went) in the reader's mouth were, ' He that troubleth
you shall bear his judgment, whosoever he be,' and ' I would they
were even cut off that trouble you.' * The soldiers who followed did
not venture to lay hands on him, but took possession of the monastery.
When the mass was over, the archbishop sent to ask Bichenda
whether the outrage were authorised by her. She replied that she
had the chancellor's order, and that if he bade her to burn both
Dover Castle and London town,3 she would obey. The knights of
Kent, under William Auberville, son-in-law of Ranulf Glanvill, en-
treated the archbishop to take the oath of fealty to the king and
chancellor at once. Geoffrey, with his usual impetuosity, replied
that to the king he had already sworn fealty, and would not do it
again upon compulsion ; as for the chancellor, he would do nothing
for him but what should be done for a traitor. The state of siege
continued for four days ; on the Sunday, Geoffrey excommunicated
Richenda ; 4 thereupon the soldiers took possession of the church.
By the evening Matthew de Cleres, the constable, arrived in person,
a little shocked by his wife's zeal, but his entreaties failed to persuade
Geoffrey to take the oath. At last, on the Wednesday, he was arrested
by a band of mercenary soldiers, under Aubrey Marney, an Essex
knight, and Alexander Puinctel, a hanger-on of the chancellor.5 He
was dragged from the altar, where he had been assisting at mass, and
brought on foot, for he refused to mount a horse, carrying his archi-
episcopal cross, to the castle.

The news of the outrage spread like wildfire ; the few parallels
which presented themselves with the sufferings of S. Thomas invested
Geoffrey for the time with the character of a church champion/'
S. Hugh of Lincoln, who was at Oxford, excommunicated with lighted
candles ' the castellan and his wife, with all their aiders and abettors.
The bishop of London hastened to Norwich to remonstrate with the

1 Gir. Camb. V. Galfr. p. 390.

* This is mentioned by Benedict, ii.
210, and Hoveden, iii. 138. Yet the
day was the feast of the Exaltation of
the Cross, and the epistle for that day
does not contain these words ; nor
does that for the week (the 1 3th
Sunday after Trinity), although it is
taken from the same epistle, that of
8. Paul to the Galatians. Either the
historians have imagined a coinci-

dence, or 'the missal of the monks of
8. Martin's had a peculiar rite for the
day.

» Gir. Camb. V. Galfr. p. 390.

4 Gir. Carnb. V. Galfr. p. 391.

» R. de Diceto, 663.

• Gir. Camb. V. Galfr. 391. R. de
Diceto, 668. Gervase, 1576. W. Newb.
iv. 17, p. 48.

7 Gir. Camb. V. Galfr. p. 392.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN 237

chancellor : l the bishop of Norwich, that old John of Oxford, who The bishops
had known so long the dangerous waters on which Longchamp was with ix>ug-
launching, forgot his failing health,2 and urged the immediate c
liberation of the archbishop in very brisk argument. The prior and
convent of Canterbury, on whose goodwill he had so much reason to
depend, wrote more in sorrow than in anger.3 In vain the chancellor
cursed the zeal of his friends and the fickleness of his master.4 He
lamented the outrage. He had given no such orders ; he had simply
directed that the archbishop should take the oath of fealty to the king,
which he had not yet done since his consecration, and that if he The charge
refused he should be sent, bag and baggage, to Whitsand. In vain t-Selfupby
he showed the letters-patent in which Geoffrey had promised to stay a11 hi3 nvals
away for three years.5 His blunder was more fatal to him than his
crimes. His enemies had at last secured a charge which would unite
all classes against him ; or, for all classes were already against him,
would give them a common excuse for action.

Hugh of Nunant drew together the strings of the plot.6 As Hugh of
soon as the arrest was known he hastened to John at Lancaster, and works upon
pointed out to him the greatness of the opportunity. Together they
came immediately to Marlborough,7 whither John invited the chief
men on whom he could depend, either as personally attached to him-
self, or as likely, for the sake of keeping order in the country, to take
part against the chancellor. Longchamp, in compliance with the
remonstrances of his friends, sent a hurried order for the archbishop's
release.8 He was obeyed ; Geoffrey was conducted back to S. Release of
Martin's after eight days of restraint,9 for it had not been an un- He^Jelfto
courteous captivity, on the 26th of September ; he stayed there I
until the 28th, and then proceeded to London, where the bishop
Richard FitzNeal received him with a solemn procession at S. Paul's
on Wednesday the 2nd of October.10 The chancellor was now
assembling his friends and preparing for the first new move that
John and his party might take.

We inquire in vain what the justices had been doing all this inactivity of
time. Richard had appointed, at various times, William Marshall,
William Briwere, Hugh Bardulf, Geoffrey FitzPeter, Robert de
Wihtefeld and Roger FitzRainfrai, as assessors to the chancellor.
We do not find a trace of opposition on their part to the oppressions

1 R. de Diceto, 663. not too harsh to call it a plot. See

* Gir. Camb. V. Galf., p. 392. R. Devizes, 37.

3 Epp. Cantuar. 344. Gervase, " Gir. Camb. 393.

1576. " W. Newb. p. 49. R. Devizes, 36.

4 Epp. Cantuar. 344, 345. Gerv. » Triduanus, R. Devizes, 36. Die

1577. R. Devizes, 36. septima, Gervase, 1577. Sept. 26th,

5 Epp. Cantuar. 345. R. de Diceto, 663.

« Gir. Camb. V. Galf. p. 393. It is 10 R. de Diceto, 663.

238

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

Their con-
nivance at
Long-
chain p'spro-

. . .llllLT-

Tliey uow
take part
ugaiust him

The justices,
bishops, and
barons meet
John at

Marl 1 .0
rough

charged against Longchamp ; they had joined in his refusal to admit
Hugh de Puiset as justiciar ; ' they had not resigned their seats, or
stood aloof when he treated them with neglect. Yet they joined
immediately in John's proposal for his overthrow.2 It was, perhaps,
the sight of Hugh de Puiset's unlucky attempt to resist him that
intimidated them, hut it is more probable that, although they dis-
liked their chief and were glad of an opportunity to get rid of him,
they could not disown his acts, and perhaps saw nothing enormous
about them. William Marshall was a brave soldier, but he had
been hand and glove with the younger Henry in his treason,3 and
his wisdom had yet twenty years to ripen before he became governor
of England and her king. Geoffrey FitzPeter also was an able and
moderate minister, whose character was to develop under the dis-
cipline of the next reign. Of William Briwere 4 we know little that
is distinctive, but he was certainly a trusted man of business. Roger
FitzRainfrai we have seen apparently on the chancellor's side in
the quarrel with John.5 None of them were yet marked men.
Richard had done foolishly in taking away those of their own class
who could have led them and kept them together. Just now, if
Giraldus is right, they were scattered through the country, pre-
paring perhaps for the Michaelmas audit of the Exchequer. William
Marshall was in Gloucestershire, William Briwere in Oxfordshire,
Geoffrey FitzPeter in Northamptonshire.6 One by one they received
John's invitation, and one by one they accepted it. The bishop of
Winchester, who had suffered so much from Longchamp, the bishop
of Bath, who had hitherto been his friend,7 who had negotiated for
him the business of the legation, followed. They met at Marlborough,
and the arrival of the archbishop of Rouen gave a head and authority
to their proceedings. The time was clearly come for him to act up
to his fullest powers. The chancellor must be sacrificed before John
had time to bind to himself, by complicity in revolution, the barons
who were now loyal enough to Richard, although they hated and
had just grounds of complaint against his representative.

Longchamp could not at first see the difficulty of his situation ;
he saw that the muster at Marlborough was a step to revolution, but

1 B. Devizes, p. 12.

* Gir. Camb. V. Oalfr. 393-

1 Ben. Pet. i. 46.

4 Notwithstanding Ifcfe. English
sound of his name, \VlMMn was a
Norman by extraction, and. feis family
name in full is Briegucrne. It is
frequently spelled by Ho9*Ani, in MS.
A, Brigwere, and is solftttd down
gradually through Briewert, Briwere,
Bruere, &c.

4 Hoveden, iii. 137.

• Gir. Camb. V. Galfr., 393. William
Marshall was sheriff of Gloucestershire
this year, and William Briwere of
Oxfordshire. Geoffrey FitzPeter had
been so in Northamptonshire in 1189 ;
but Richard of Engaine had paid 300
marks for three years' tenure of the
office and was now sheriff. Rot. Pip.
3 Rich. I.

' W. Newb. iv. 17, p. 49.

THE CHRONICLE OF EOGER OF HOVEDEN 289

he could not see the enormity of the offence that he had given, and Lonj.'-
-above all he was ignorant of the policy, and even of the commission, ^raSonTfor
of the archbishop of Rouen. He issued orders to Geoffrey to appear '
in London before the barons of the kingdom, and to the bishops and
justices who had joined John to leave him immediately as a traitor.1
He was, however, so far in the dark that he allowed Geoffrey 2 to
leave London and join the party of malcontents, who had now ad-
vanced by Oxford, where they had picked up S. Hugh of Lincoln, to
Reading. He himself proceeded from Norwich to London, and He comes to
thence to Windsor,3 to watch the movements of the other side, andisin-
There he was met by a summons to attend a conference or parliament Inference
of the barons which was to be held on the 5th of October at the
bridge over the Loddon, about four miles from Reading and twelve
from Windsor.4

The 5th of October was a Saturday — an unlucky day for oaths conference

, ., , , -i ,1 i 11 i • at the bridge

.and contracts, as men thought — and the chancellor, much against of the Lod-
his will, set out from Windsor with the bishops of London, and the
earls of Arundel, Norfolk, and Warren, who seem to have stuck to
him until now. But at the fourth mile from Windsor his heart ixmgchamp
failed him ; he saw that his companions were without spirit to hearted
support him, and that his policy was not to endanger his own
liberty. He sent on his friends, and complaining of illness, returned
to the castle. They, not rendered more enthusiastic by his desertion,
proceeded to the place of meeting.5

There were assembled the two archbishops, the bishops of London, Barons and
Winchester, Bath, Lincoln, and Coventry ; John earl of Mortain, Bembied*3
William of Arundel, Roger Bigod of Norfolk, Hamelin of Warren,
and WTilliam Marshall of Strigul ; Geoffrey FitzPeter, William
Briwere, and many other barons, with their retainers. As soon as
the assembly was got together and order proclaimed, the archbishop speeches of
of York stood up and exhibited his complaints ; the documents by Hu^oi''
which the king had authorised his return and his participation in !5un.anitr and

the justices

public business were read and explained by Hugh of Nunant to the
barons.6 The archbishop of Rouen followed ; he had been sent by
the king to arrange the election at Canterbury, with the fullest
powers and the most private instructions, yet the chancellor had
forbidden him to proceed on his mission — nay, he had sent him
word that he would cross London Bridge at his peril ; further, he
had never once since he landed in April been consulted by the chan-
cellor on any matter whatever.7 In the third place the justices,

1 Gir. Camb. pp. 393, 394. 5 Gir. Camb. p. 395. Bened. ii. p.

2 Ibid. p. 394. 212.

3 Ibid. p. 394, * Gir. Camb., p. 395.

4 Ibid. p. :i94. ' • Ibid. p. 395.

240

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVE DEN

Complaint*
of Ixmg-
cbampg
upeeial
low

Walter of
Coutances
shows his
band at last

Negotiations
between
Longehamp
and John

He fails to
make friend- .

aud i« ex-
communi-
cated

especially William Marshall, William Briwere, and Geoffrey Fitz Peter
asserted that their counsels, which he was obliged by the king's express
orders to respect, were never attended to. Even the earl of Arundel,
who seems to have wished to say what he could for him, could not
deny this.1 There were other complaints of a less general cha-
racter. Hugh of Durham and his son Henry sent in the tale of their
wrongs.8 Henry de Vere in particular, who had been deprived of
his estates through the chancellor's agency, probably in favour of
Stephen Longchamp, who was his brother-in-law, was bitterly
urgent against him ; 3 Roger FitzRainfrai forsook him completely.
The conclusion of the whole deliberation was put by the archbishop
of Rouen ; he pledged the barons present to rise against the chan-
cellor, to depose him, as useless to the king and kingdom, from the
office of justiciar, and to appoint another in his place.4 Whether on
this occasion Walter of Coutances produced his commission cannot
be quite ascertained, but he clearly left the assembly assured that he
had good authority for his proceedings. The bishops of London,
Lincoln, and Coventry were deputed to fetch the chancellor at once
to hear his fate, but before they had gone far they met his messengers
reporting that he had returned to Windsor.5

Sunday, October 6, was a busy day. Very early, messengers
began to pass between Windsor and Reading. The chancellor sent
two of his confidential servants to persuade John to intercede for
him ; knowing John's weakness, they were to promise any amount of
money to him and his like. Personal mediation, as in the case of
William de Braiose, who had the courage to make a move for his
friend, was also employed. But all that was attained was an invita-
tion to meet the barons at the old place on the morrow ; if the chan-
cellor declined to appear there and give account of his misdeeds, he
was to expect no more consideration from the barons.6 By the
arguments of his friends he was prevailed upon to promise to attend
and so pledge himself. The bishops lost no time. At High Mass
in the morning the bishop of Bath acted as celebrant, and Hugh of
Nunant preached ; the point of application of his sermon was the
excommunication of all aiders and abettors of the outrage on the
archbishop of York. Not only Aubrey Marney and Alexander
Puinctel, but the chancellor himself was named in the anathema,
and denounced as excommunicate.7

Probably the news of this act diminished still further Long-

1 Gir. Camb. 359.

1 Benedict, ii. 212.

» B. de Diceto, 664. Henry de Vere
married a daughter of Osbert de Cailly,
and co-heiress with Stephen's wife, of
Mutford in Suffolk ; see Stapleton,

Norman Rolls, ii. cxv. There may
have been other grounds of quarrel.

4 Gir. Camb. 395, 896.

» Ibid.

• Ibid. 396.

' B. de Diceto, 664.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN 241

champ's inclination for a parley. The postponed meeting did not Both parties
take place ; both parties dreaded treachery. The barons, on the London, on
Monday morning, after marching in order out of Beading, crossed the ^.1^m*kjr
Loddon and sent their baggage under the charge of a strong guard
through the forest to Staines, whilst they themselves proceeded on the
highway towards Windsor.1 The chancellor on his part advanced about
two miles to meet them, when he was met by one of his knights,
Henry Biset,2 who had seen the division of the forces and the larger
part taking the London road. He immediately gave the alarm ; the
malcontents were going to seize the capital. Longchamp hastily
returned to the castle, and, having made a hurried arrangement for
its defence, started, as he supposed, in pursuit ; crossed the Thames
and took the northern as the shorter road, in order to intercept the
enemy. The barons, hearing of his departure, pursued him at
full speed, and it became a race who should reach London first ; the
chancellor's retinue, having the start, arrived a little before the
others, but not in time to avoid a skirmish in which Eoger de skirmish on
Plasnes, John's justiciar, was killed 3 by Ralph Beauchamp, one of
the chancellor's knights. This must have occurred somewhere near
Hounslow, where the direct road from Windsor meets that from
Staines, which the barons had taken.

As soon as Longchamp arrived in London, he called together the Longchamp
citizens in the Guildhall,4 and entreated them to defend the king's Sittzensiu
right against the attacks of John, who, according to his view, had \^Gu
thrown away every scruple, and was now plainly aiming at the crown.5
To his dismay, his words seemed without effect. Archbishop Geoffrey,
in his passage through the capital the week before, had made too
good use of his time ; he had taught his friends to regard the struggle
as merely an attempt to unseat the justiciar, no treason being contem-
plated towards the king.6 The magnates of the city were divided —
Richard FitzReiner, the head of one party, took the side of John.
Henry of Cornhell was faithful to the chancellor.7 These two knights TWO parties
had been sheriffs at Richard's coronation, and both represented the
ancient burgher aristocracy : Reiner, the father of Richard, the son
of Berenger, had filled the same office ; 8 and Henry was the son of
Gervase of Cornhell, who had held the sheriffdom of Kent, which,
with that of Surrey, the son now held. It is probable that Richard
headed the party of change, and Henry, who was more closely

1 Benedict, ii. 211, 212. 5 Gir. Camb. 397.

2 Gir. Camb. 396, 97. R. Devizes, e R. Devizes, 38.
p. 37. 7 Gir. Camb. 397.

3 R.deDiceto, 064. Benedict, ii. 212. " Madox, Hist. Exch. p. 476, 194.
* R. Devizes, 38. Gir. Camb. Rot, Pip. 2, 3, 4 Hen. II. pp. 17, 18,

397: — 'In aula publica quae a potorum 27, 112. Rot. Pip. 1 Rich. I. p. 223.
conventu nomen accepit.' Liber de Antiquis Legibus, p. 1.

R

242

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

Lonirrliamp

hlraaelf to
the Tower

John under-
takes to
confirm the
fommuna of
the citizen •*

Meeting at
8. Paul's
Tuesday,
Oct. 8

Walter of
Oontances
produces his
commission

connected with the country interest, and, through his office of former
of the Mint, with the Exchequer, that of order.1 The division in coun-
cil was so even that the chancellor thought it his safest plan to take up
his quarters in the Tower. This he had scarcely done when John
arrived. He was welcomed by Richard FitzBeiner with open arms,
and entertained in his house, where he learned the terms on which
he was to expect the adherence of the city." The burghers had long
been anxious to obtain for themselves the royal recognition of their
corporate character, or communa. This had been opposed to the
theory of Henry II., who instead of conferring political or municipal
independence on towns by- charter, preferred to deal out his benefac-
tions by the medium of fines, keeping thus the power of withdrawing
them in his own hands. Henry knew and probably disliked the
foreign idea of the commune : ' tumor plebis, timor regni, tepor
sacerdotii." 3 John, however, had no scruples. He was ready to
promise for the whole party that they would swear to observe the
rights and customs of the citizens, and accordingly in the morning
of Tuesday, when the assembly met at S. Paul's, this large and aristo-
cratic body was fully represented.4 The city had, indeed, quarrelled
with Longchamp by refusing, at his request, to shut the gates against
John, and a large proportion of the burghers was prepared to take
extreme measures against him.5

The scene in S. Paul's seems to have been a repetition of that of
the Loddon. First Geoffrey, then Hugh of Nunant, told the story of
the chancellor's misdeeds ; the wrongs of Hugh de Puiset and the
ignominy heaped on the justices were not forgotten.6 Then, for the
first time, Walter of Coutances produced the commission dated in
February, addressed to William Marshall and his fellow justices,
and directing that in case of the chancellor's misconduct he should
be superseded by the archbishop.7 The barons, at John's insti-
gation, at once recognised the letter as genuine, and declared by
acclamation that the chancellor was no longer the governor of the
kingdom, that the archbishop of Rouen was now the king's chief
justiciar. John himself should be regarded as regent, ' summus rector

1 Madox, Hist. Exch. p. 631.
This year Henry de Cornhell renders
account of 1,2001. which he has re-
ceived of the treasure, by the brief
of the chancellor, to sustain the Mint
of all England, except Winchester,
and of 4001. the profit of the Mint for
a year, in all 1,6002. He must have
been closely connected in this way
with the chancellor, and his connexion
with the court may have set him in
opposition to the supporters of the
guild or communa. This theory

seems to be supported by the fact of
his marriage with Alice de Courcy,
and that of his daughter with Hugh
Nevill, the master forester of England.
See Mr. Stapleton's preface to the
Liber de Antiquis Legibus, p. 11.

* R. de Diceto, 664. Gir. Camb. V.
Galfr. 897, 398.

R. Devizes, 53, 54.

Gir. Camb. 398 ; Bened. ii. 213.

R. Devizes, 38.

Bened. ii. 213.

Bened. ii. 213; ' tuncprimum.'

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN 243

totius regni ' ; l next under him should be the archbishop as The barons
justiciar ; under him the other justices would have no difficulty in Mm'as'chief
acting, and again the whole administration of the country would be iu^iute
able to work. In this recognition of John the assembly went beyond ^^
anything that had been contemplated by Richard or even by Walter
of Coutances ; the office of regent, if it existed formally at all, being
filled already by the queen-mother, whose absence from England had
thrown considerable additional weight into the scale against Long-
champ. This done, oaths were largely taken : John, the justiciar, oatiis taken
and the barons, swore to maintain the communa of London ; 2 the umna ;
oath of fealty to Richard was then sworn, John taking it first, then fealty sworn
the two archbishops, the bishops, the barons, and last the burghers,
with the express understanding that, should the king die without
issue, they would receive John as his successor.3

The sentence had still to be enforced on Longchamp, and the Longchauip
citizens willingly joined in besieging the Tower. Unfortunately for the Tower
the chancellor, it was not victualled for a siege, or, with time on his
side, he might still have won.4 Henry of Cornhell was ready to divide ms chances
the city in his favour ; John, having got all that he wanted, might
be bought over, especially as his object now would be to undermine
the authority of the new justiciar. The party had been brought
together by an accident, and any accident might dissolve it. But
the state of the stores would not admit of Longchamp standing a
siege, and both Geoffrey and Hugh of Nunant saw that their only
safety was in his downfall. He was obliged to offer terms to the new He applies
powers, and early on the Wednesday the four bishops of London, puiation and

resign

Lincoln, Winchester, and Coventry,5 were sent in answer to his
application, and to declare at the same time the resolution of the
assembly. According to Giraldus, they found him in an abject
state of prostration, mental and physical ; he knelt before them — he
swooned away from the violence of his agitation. Richard of Devizes
confirms the story of his fainting, and adds that he was recovered by
the sprinkling of cold water on his face ; he ascribes the swoon to
angry excitement and not to fear.6 He was told that he must resign
the seal and surrender the king's castles. He declared that he He refuses to
would do neither ; he charged the barons with disloyalty to Richard ;
already they had given the kingdom to John. He threatened them
with the king's anger, if he should ever live to see him. As for the
castles, how could he surrender them ? None of his house had ever

1 R. Devizes, p. 38. 6 R. Devizes, 39. As this writer is

2 Gir. Camb. 398. Bened. ii. 214. anything but favourable to Long-
R. Devizes, 53, 54. R. de Diceto, 664. chump, I think his statements may be

3 R. de Diceto, 664. Bened. ii. 214. accepted always in mitigation of

4 W. Newb. p. 50. Giraldus's language,

5 Gir. Camb. 398.

R2

244

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF IIOVEDEN

He I* In-
tutted by
Hugh of

Nonniit

In the
evening be

:lKTiv- til

appear
next day
before the

justices

Longchamp
nu-fts the
barons on
Thursday
Oct. 10

Terms
offered him
by Hugh of

Nuuaut

He declares
his inno-
cence of the

He consents
to give
pledges for
the surren-
der of liis
castles

yet been a traitor. Hugh of Nunant argued like a brute : ' Do not
talk to us about your house, but do what you ought to do ; what
cannot be avoided, it is of no use to dally over. Depend on it, your
house, young as it is, cannot account you its first traitor. ' ' Prostrate
as Longchamp was, he held his ground in argument until evening,
when, having tried to bribe John,3 and found that if he were success-
ful with him there were, besides, more enemies than he could pur-
chase, he yielded at nightfall to the entreaties of his servants, and
allowed one of his brothers to go to John to say that he agreed to
give hostages for his appearance before the justices the next day.3
The hostages were his brother Osbert and Matthew de Cleres.4
Whilst this was being done, or perhaps, earlier in the day, the bishops
executed one little piece of spite against him, by procuring the elec-
tion of William Postard as abbot of Westminster, to the destruction
of the chancellor's scheme of promoting his brother Robert.5

The barons met in great force early on the morning of Thursday,
October 10th, in the fields to the east of the Tower, and there at last
William Longchamp stood face to face with his accusers.6 With
singular ill-feeling, Hugh of Nunant undertook to declare the charges
and the ultimatum of the barons. For justiciar they would have
him no longer ; bishop he might be still, but justiciar he was not,
and as chancellor they would do their best to strip him. He might
keep three castles, Dover, Cambridge, and Hereford ; but the rest he
must resign ; he must give pledges to keep the peace, and might
then go where he liked. Longchamp could scarcely have entertained
any hope of changing the mood of his enemies by a speech, but he
seems to have been overwhelmed by the volubility of the bishop, at
once declaring the indictment and pronouncing the sentence.
When he found words he declared himself innocent of every charge.
His fellow justices could,7 he said, if they were questioned, justify all
that he had done to raise revenue for the king, and for every farthing
he had so raised he could render an account. For the surrender of
the castles, as he was in their power, he would give pledges, but his
offices he could not resign, nor would he recognise the act of his
enemies in deposing him. ' I am one, you are many, and you are
stronger than I. I, the chancellor of the king and justiciar of the
kingdom, sentenced contrary to the form of all law, yield to the
stronger, for yield I must.' 8 So much said, and the words were true
and not deficient in dignity, the meeting closed. That night Long-

1 Giraldus, p. 398.
1 Ibid. 'Comitem Moritonije adeo
ab incepto fere Cancellarius avertit.'
1 B. Devizes, 40. Gir. Camb. 398.
4 Gir. Camb. 398.

6 R. de Diceto, 664.

' R. Devizes, 40. Gir. Camb. 398
R. de Diceto, 665.

7 R. Devizes, 41.
• Ibid. 41, 42.

THE CHKONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN 245

•champ slept in the Tower j1 on the Friday he gave up both that and On Friday,

Windsor, and moved with his baggage to Bermondsey.2 On the quits the

Saturday he proceeded, in company with Bishop Gilbert of Eochester

and Henry of Cornhell, to Dover.3 His reason for going into Kent

was said to be that he might lay down at Canterbury the cross of

his legation, which had expired on the death of Clement III. ; but the

events that followed showed that this was a mere pretext.4 He had

been compelled to swear to surrender all the king's castles and to leave

the appointment of constables for his own three to the justices ; s

until this was completed he was not to quit the country. Windsor

and the Tower he had given up, but he could not bear to do more.

Neglectful of the safety of his pledges, his brothers Henry and He attempts

Osbert,6 as well as of his own oath, he attempted, in the dress of a befonfhe

woman, to escape on board ship, on the Thursday after his arrival at the comii-ed

Dover.7 This was prevented ; he was dragged into the town and im- *n hSim°rced

prisoned with great ignominy in a cellar. The justices, on hearing

of his discomfiture, issued immediate orders for his release, and He is taken

, . 11-11- • i -i • -iiit- i • au(l insulted,

having compelled him to yield in every point, let mm go his way. Oct. is ;
He crossed over to Whitsand on the 29th of October. His misfor- SfaS*
tunes did not end here ; he was seized, plundered, and put to ransom ^^4
by the Flemish nobles.8 Oct. 29

This little crisis occupies in our histories a place more propor- importance
iionate to the interests of its personal incidents than to its her^de"8'
constitutional importance.9 The proceedings of the barons were scnbed
revolutionary. Although the question of allegiance to the king does
not enter formally into the complication, the insurrection must be
regarded as of the same character as those by which from time to
time the king's tenure of power has been directly attacked — the
machinery which has the power to make laws interposes with
effect to meet a case and to overcome difficulties for which the laws
have failed to provide ; to punish the offences of a person who by
circumstances, as in this case, or on theory as in the case of the
monarch, is above the ordinary process of the law. The accused, Thepro-
when such a consummation is imminent, cannot expect to secure reauy'fevo-
the benefit of legal treatment ; rightfully or wrongfully he must be lutionary
condemned ; for he whom in such a position it is possible to bring
to trial has fallen too low to be able to resist, although not so low

1 R. de Diceto, 665. lii. 146. R. Devizes, p. 42. R.

2 Gir. Camb. 399. R. de Diceto, 665. Diceto, 665.

1 R. de Diceto, 665. 8 R. de Diceto, 665. Hoveden, iii.

4 Benedict, ii. 219. Hoveden, iii. 150. Ben. Pet. ii. 220. R. Devizes, 42.

145. 9 Sir Francis Palgrave has given a

4 Gir. Camb. 398. recension of it in the preface to the

8 R. de Diceto, 665. first volume of the Rotuli Curise Regis,

7 Benedict, ii. 219, 220. Hoveden, which is very valuable.

246

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

Revolution
made pos-
sible by
Long-
champ'8
misconduct,
but pro-
duced by
John's in-
trigue*

Opportunity
and cause of
revolution

Conduct of
the arch-
bishop of
Rouen at
the crisis

His success
In the crisis

His com-
parative
failure as a
minister

as to be safely spared. Nor does our history present us with a case
in which the wrong-doings of such a person have by themselves
provoked the revolution which overwhelms him. He falls under the
accumulation of hatred, not because of it ; it is because there is
some one ready to take his place, who cannot afford to wait. So it
may often be that the pretexts of revolution are out of all harmony
with its real justification, and have nothing whatever to do with its
definite causes. Longcharnp's position was unrighteous and
tyrannical ; the hatred he had inspired was widely spread and not
unwarranted ; the movement by which he fell was of the nature of a
conspiracy ; the real objects which his enemies had in view were
strictly selfish aims after personal or political aggrandisement.
It was, however, a good precedent against John himself in after years.

The man who appears to the most advantage in the matter is the
new minister, the Pilate of Rouen, who, if not a strong man, was an
honest one, and in the main gave himself as thoroughly as Long-
champ had done to the king's interests. If we consider that he was
sent by Richard to England to hold the balance of power between
John and Longchamp ; to humour John as long as he could do so
without encouraging him in his disaffection ; to strengthen the chan-
cellor unless he found it was no longer possible to keep peace
between him and the barons ; that he knew all the time that Long-
champ was trusted by Richard, and that John only lacked the power
to be a traitor ; and if we consider further that in the motley band
of malcontents with whom he had to work there were not two who
had the same object in view ; that John was striving for the increase
of his own power and the right of succession, that Geoffrey was
struggling for the see of York, whilst Hugh de Puiset, who for the
moment was working with him, was bent on vindicating his personal
independence of his metropolitan ; that the barons cared far more to
get rid of Longchamp than to administer the kingdom under himself,
also a foreigner, and scarcely less suspected than Longchamp : we
we may, I think, regard his conduct of the crisis as skilful and
complete. He managed to get rid, by John's aid, of the chancellor
who could govern no more, and yet to keep the substance of power
as far as ever out of John's reach.

But his own administration was not very successful. Although
strengthened by the support of the queen, he was unable to meet the
manoeuvres of John aided by Philip of France. The result was that
from the moment of Richard's captivity he lost his grasp on the
reins of government, and the country was only saved from anarchy
by the management of Hubert Walter, who superseded him after
two years and throe months of office in the opening of the year 1194.

The archbishop's first piece of work was a failure. The day of

THE CHKONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

247

Election of

Beginalii

FitzJocdiu

Longcharap's surrender, October 10, letters were issued for a meeting Business of
of the bishops at Westminster on the 22nd, and for the election of a to can'tcr-
successor to Baldwin.1 The king had not yet withdrawn his nomina- ury
tion of the archbishop of Montreal ; the monks were suspected of
wishing to elect the chancellor ; the archbishop of Eouen, who was
supposed to have the king's instructions, was also suspected of wishing
to exchange a poor archbishopric for a rich one.2 The monks were
really inclined to a delay which prolonged the day of their own
independence and would increase the chances of their patron. But
the justiciar was pressing, and they could resist no longer. After a
preliminary meeting on October 22, they made the election on
December 2. The bishop of Bath, whom no one seems to have
thought of before, was elected. He died a few weeks after, but his
election had satisfied the occasion.3 No new one could be made
before the king had been consulted, and leave to elect granted. The
primacy continued for a year and a half longer unfilled.

As a matter of course, Longchamp's more offensive acts were Long-,

. . . . champs acts

now remedied ; the bishop of Winchester was reinstated in the castle reversed
of which he had been deprived ; the county of Northumberland was
delivered over to Hugh de Puiset ; 4 Osbert and Henry Longchamp
were removed from their sheriffdoms, and the latter imprisoned at
Cardiff.5 The Yorkshiremen who had got into trouble about the
Jews were restored to their estates.6 The bishops were instructed
to take no notice of the legate's letters. Geoffrey returned to his cross-fire of
see, and before Christmas had time to excommunicate his late ally cations ™
the bishop of Durham.7 Hugh bore the sentence with equanimity,
and met it by contriving new difficulties for the metropolitan, for
whose sanctity he had been so lately ready to fight. The archbishop
of Rouen regarded the chancellor as lying still under the Beading
anathema. Longchamp, as soon as his legation was renewed, issued
an excommunication, in which he included the whole ministry. Not
content with this, he named seriatim all his great enemies — the
bishop of Winchester, Hugh of Nunant, the four co-justices ; 8 Richard
Malbysse, the persecutor of the Jews and ally of Hugh de Puiset ;
Roger FitzRainfrai who had deserted him at the last ; Henry de Vere,

1 Epp. Cantuar. 8-18.

2 Gervase, 1580.

:| See Epp. Cantuar. pref. pp.
Ixxxvi-xc.

4 E. Devizes, 39.

•'• Gir. Camb., 399.

'• See above, p. 219, note. Richard
Malbysse did not keep long out of
mischief; in 1194 we find 'Ricardus
de Malbysse reddit computum de 300
marcis pro habenda benevolentia regis,

quia dicebatur fuisse cum comite
Johanne ; et ut sit quietus de foris-
facto occisionis Judseorum Ebor<ici, et
pro habendis terris et ward is et fores-
taria sua sicut habuit quando rex
iter arripuit Jerusalem.' liot. Pip. 6
Rich. I.

• Ben. Pet. ii. 225.

s Ben. Pet. ii. 223. Hoveden, ii.
153, 154.

248

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

Kxcommu-

iiic.iti"ii- by
Lougcliamp

His tlm :,t •
iiddressed to
John

Reaction in
fa TOUT of
Lougchamp

He visits
Paris and
goes thence
to Nor-
mandy

Obscurity of
the early
events of
1192

Philip's
return re-
kindles the
ambition of
John

his brother Stephen's competitor for the Baudemont heritage ; Gerard
Camville, the delinquent of Lincoln ; Stephen Ridell, the chancellor
of John, and the best endowed clerk in the diocese of Ely ; Master
Benedict, who pretended to bear the king's seal ; the earl of Salis-
bury and the count of Meulan ; two of the Bassets, and Simon of
Avranches, lord of Folkestone, are thrown in, perhaps as having
taken part in the Dover outrage ; Earl John himself is spared, and
Hugh Bardulf ; but the latter is ordered to give up the sheriffdom
of Yorkshire to William Stuteville, and John, if he does not take care,
will find himself excommunicated on the next Quinquagesima
Sunday.

Before the chancellor ventured on this act he had received very
encouraging news from Rome. The pope had not yet renewed his
legation, but addressed him as if it had never been interrupted.1 The
savage attack made upon him by the bishop of Coventry had caused
some little reaction in his favour. Peter of Blois wrote manfully for
him ; 2 Celestine III. would hear nothing from the other side ; he
argued, in fact, from his knowledge of Richard's trust in Longchamp
and the obsequiousness of the bishops and barons in the days of his
prosperity, that the attack on him was more prompted by envy and
jealousy than it really was.3 The chancellor's steadfast purpose was
to make his way back^to England. After his expulsion he had passed
through Glanders to Paris, where he had been received with pro-
cessions, at his own expense, by the bishop at Notre Dame.4
Returning to Normandy he found himself treated everywhere as
excommunicate ; neither the office of chancellor nor the title of
legate spared him this humiliation.' Whilst he was there, Philip
returned from Palestine.

Historians have recorded of the early events of 1192 little more
than the cross-fire of excommunications ; the interest of the period
is in the crusade. John's plots and Longchamp's counter-plots lie
below the surface. But we can see that Philip's return has intro-
duced a new element into the calculations of both ; that Philip's
object is to injure Richard wherever he has the chance, by stirring
up war on the Continent and persuading John to unsettle England.

John spent Christmas at Howden, with Bishop Hugh, learning
how to behave under excommunication.6 Early in the year he
received two communications. Philip invited him to France to a
conference, offering him his brother's French possessions with the

1 Benedict, ii. 221. Hoveden. iii.
151.

1 Hoveden, iii. 148-150.
1 Hoveden, iii. 190, 191. Bened.ii.

242-244. W. Newb. iv. 18, p. 53.
4 Benedict, ii. 220.
4 Ibid. ii. 221.
• Hoveden, iii. 179. Bened. ii. 235.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

249

hand of the precious Alais ; l William Longchamp offered him a round
sum in money if he would contrive his restoration.2 John listened
to both the tempters, contrary as their purposes were. He had
found by this time that the archbishop of Eouen was not inclined
to give way to him, and that the title of ruler of all England which
he had assumed was less effective than the more constitutional rule
of the justiciar. He promised to visit Philip ; he also premised to
do his best for Longchamp. It would seem that Eleanor was the
first to hear of these negotiations, and the news quickly brought her
to England. The chancellor had visited Philip in order to lay before
him a complaint of the seizure of his property by the Flemish
nobles ; 3 and the juxtaposition of two such men was not a little
alarming. The queen landed at Portsmouth on February II,4 and
found John ready to sail to France. Very determined he proved
himself. Between Sexagesima Sunday and Easter the queen held
four councils of the barons, at Windsor, London, Oxford, and
Winchester.5 John showed himself more obdurate than was con-
ceived. He not only persisted but plotted. He actually succeeded
in persuading the constables of Windsor and Wallingford to hand
over their castles to him.6 It was only by the severest remonstrances
that he was prevailed upon to give up his projected visit. The
archbishop, with Eleanor and the justices, threatened that the moment
he embarked they would seize, in the king's name, every castle and
manor that he possessed.7

In the midst of the excitement caused by these discussions, the
bishop of Ely landed at Dover and took up his quarters with his
sister in the castle.8 John had listened to his overtures, and now
that he and the archbishop of Eouen had quarrelled, the support of
the chancellor would be very important to him. Accordingly, about
the fifth week in Lent, Longchamp wrote from Dover to the heads
of the government — the queen, John, and the justices — offering to
stand his trial and demanding the restoration of his property. Now,
Eleanor as well as John would have listened. She had prevailed
already on the archbishop to release the estates of the see and
withdraw the excommunication ; 9 Longchamp also withdrew his
sentence against the justices. But even if these could have safely
admitted his return, the barons were implacable. Little news came

1 Benedict, ii. 236. R. Devizes, 56. 1580. R. Devizes, 57, 58. W. Newb.

Proposals ot
Philip and
Longchamp
to John

* Bened. ii. 239. R. Devizes, 57.

3 R. Devizes, 55.

4 R. Devizes, 55. Gervase, 1580.

5 R. Devizes, 57.

6 Ibid.

7 Benedict, ii. 257.

9 In the middle of March, Gervase,

iv. 18, p. 54. Benedict, ii. 239. Gir.
Camb. V. Galfr. 402 (circa kalendas
Aprilis).

9 R. Devizes, 56. Gir. Camb. V.
Galfr. 402. According to Gervase he
came to England by the queen's
invitation, c. 1580.

Longchamp
visits Philip

Eleanor
returns to
England
and compels
John to re-
nounce his
projects

Determined
opposition of
the queen to
John

Longchamp

lands at
Dover in
March

His pro-
posals to the
queen, John,
and the

justices

250

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF IIOVEDEN

The liaroni

I vf !!-• U>

listni to him

John ac-
cepts a
bribe from
the justices
and forsakes
his new ally

Longchamn
ordered to
quit Kng-

He sends
complaints
to Richard

M --ii.il Of

John of
Alencon

Capture of

the kiiiLT

The queen's
pacific in-
fluence in
England

from Palestine. John's succession seemed more than imminent,
and with Longchamp they would have nothing to do. John pleaded
the cause of his new friend ; he saw, in fact, that his arrival gave
him the opportunity of making new terms for himself. One of the
subjects marked out for consultation in the sitting of the barons
was, what notice should be taken of John's treasonable conduct in
corrupting the constables of Windsor and Wallingford.1 By holding
out a threat to side with the chancellor, he entirely escaped inquiry
into this. And this was, perhaps, all he wanted. He made no secret
of the price at which Longchamp had bought him. ' Within a week,'
he told the justices, ' the chancellor will pay me 700Z. of silver if I
abstain from interference between him and you. Money is what you
see I want. You know what I mean ; you are wise men.'2 The
justices saw that they must buy him. They offered him 2,000 marks,
500Z. of which were to be raised from the chancellor's estates.3 John
graciously accepted the sum, and peremptory letters were at once
written by all parties to the common enemy, directing him, if he
cared for his life, to quit England. He obeyed ; sailed on the
Thursday in Holy Week ; landed again at Whitsand, and, as the
English believed, betook himself at once to the court of Philip as a
traitor.4 It is probable that his occupation was rather that of a spy ;
but we lose sight of him entirely for nearly a year. His envoy, the
prior of Hereford, had already made his way to Palestine and poured
into the king's ears the complaints which had so impressed the pope.5
He found Richard at Ascalon in April. The king was, as might be
expected, disturbed at the news, but the distressed state of the crusade
at the moment prevented his leaving. Six weeks afterwards, in
May, at the Canebrake of Starlings, John of Alencon, the vice-
chancellor, whom he had left in Normandy, reached him with new
complaints ; this time, probably, from the archbishop of Rouen : 6
but just now it was out of his power to leave with honour. The
break-up of the crusade was, however, imminent, and after a bold
but destructive march on Jerusalem in the height of summer, the
three years' truce with Saladin was concluded, and in October
Richard embarked for home. The next news of him is in January
1198, when he is reported to be in prison in Austria.

During these months the history of England is nearly a blank.
Eleanor had succeeded in producing a temporary lull in the political
strife. Hugh of Nunant had time to persecute his monks ; Geoffrey

1 R. Devizes, 57, ' cle praesuruptione
custelloruin.'

7 R. Devizes, 57, 58. W. Newb. iv.
18, p. 55.

3 Benedict, ii. 239. R. Devizes 59.

Hoveden, iii. 188.

4 Benedict, ii. 240, 241.
iii. 188.

4 Itin. R. R. 333.

• Itin. R.'R. 358.

Hoveden,

THE CHRONICLE OF EOGER OF HOVEDEN 251

of York to offend the dignity of the southern as well as to quarrel to
the point of anathema with the clergy of the northern province. The
justiciar had his hands full of Norman business. Whilst he was
acting as the king's lieutenant in England, his own unhappy province
was laid under interdict by the legates sent in consequence of Long-
champ's complaints.1 Philip was in arms, and only prevented by
a resolute remonstrance of his barons from entering Richard's
territories. Old Bishop Hugh de Puiset had to be recalled from his
retirement and sent into France to negotiate.

Eleanor seems to have continued in England during this time, Minor acts

of 1192

and her presence was a pledge of peace. Longchamp lurked in
Normandy and Aquitaine.2 John nursed his grievances at Marl-
borough and Lancaster. At the Michaelmas exchequer, Richard
Malbysse and William Percy were admitted to the possession of their
lands until the king's return, for a fine of 20 marks. Gerard
Camville was still in possession of Lincolnshire ; Hugh of Nunant
was sheriff of Warwickshire, Leicestershire, and Staffordshire ; Henry
Longchamp at Cardiff in prison.3

Towards Christmas, great uneasiness began to be felt in England Rumours of
as to the fate of the king. The pilgrims who had stayed behind him capture
in Palestine were flocking home, and the last that had been heard of
him was that the ship in which he had left Acre had been seen at
Brundusium.4 Rumours of his being in trouble reached the country.
Soon after Christmas, John received from Philip the news of the
capture and went over to Normandy in consequence.5 After intrigues of
attempting to prevail on the Norman barons to swear fealty to johu
himself, he joined Philip and agreed, according to the proposal of
the last year, to become his vassal for his brother's dominions,
including, as rumour said, England as well as Normandy.0 He
then returned to England, got possession of Windsor and Wallingford,

1 It was not in consequence of Long- 5 Hoveden, ii. 204.

champ's complaints that Normandy ° The treaty made with Philip on

was laid under interdict, but because this occasion is printed in the Foedera,

the steward had refused to receive the i. 57 ; it is dated at Paris in January,

legates without the king's licence. and amounts to a partition of the in-

Ben. Pet. ii. 247. Ii. Devizes, p. 43. heritance of Richard. It is most

- Gir. Camb. V. Galfr. 403. curious, in our present question, as

3 Rot. Pip. 4 Rich. I. Herefordsh. : containing a special provision for the
' Willelmus de Braiose non reddidit securing to Hugh ' Constan' episcopo '
computum hoc anno de firma comi- safety and restoration in case of peace
tatus neque de summonitionibus, quia being made with Richard. This Hugh
Henricus de Longocampo, qui anno can be none other than Hugh of
proximo prsecedente comitatum tenue- Nunant, and Constan' is a misprint
rat, propter captionem suam computum for Coventren'. The bishop of Cou-
non reddidit. Cujus computus opor- tances at this time was "William of
tuit computum Willehni preecedere.' Tournebu, who presided from 1179 to

4 Hoveden, iii. 194. 1199.

252

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

Communi-
cation*
opened with
the captive
king

*y to
Henry VI.

Longchamp

virite

Richard

John In
rebellion

His friends
and allies

Resistance
of the arch-
bishop of
Rooen

Capture of
John's

and demanded of the barons their recognition of him as king, now
that his brother, as he said, was dead.

The archbishop of Rouen behaved with great circumspection and
moderation. The first step was to discover where the king was ; for
this purpose the abbots of Boxley and Robertsbridge were sent to
Germany.1 To open communications with him when found, William
of S. Mere 1'Eglise, the prothonotary,2 was directed to follow, and
he was joined by Hubert Walter, who, returning after Richard from
Palestine, had heard in Sicily of his misfortunes.3 Savaric, bishop
of Bath, was directed to the imperial court to make the best terms
he could.4 Savaric was the emperor's kinsman and friend. The
abbots met the king in Franconia in March, and from that time he
was in regular communication with the government at home.5

The chancellor was one of the first to find his way to him.
Richard received him with unreserved delight, and sent him back to
England with powers to raise or to treat for the raising of the ransom,
and a general commission to do his best for him.6 But the urgent
business of the kingdom took precedence even of the king's deliver-
ance. John, as soon as the barons had definitely refused to listen
to his proposals, took up arms. Windsor and Wallingford he had
secured before his visit to France ; they were now surrendered to him
in form ; 7 Nottingham and Tickhill had been in his hands since the
year 1191 ; Lancaster and the Peak were fortified, and enabled to
resist. He had hired a large force of Welsh mercenaries, whom he
placed in Windsor.8 He had increased the number of his friends ;
Hugh Bardulf, and even William Stuteville, had become his men.9
A great fleet of French and Flemish vessels appeared off the coast
to co-operate with him,10 whilst Philip was using both force and fraud
to gain a strong hold on Normandy. But the archbishop of Rouen
was equal to the occasion ; he gladly showed that there was no
complicity between himself and John, and all the divided parties
flocked to his standard. By a hasty call of the whole population
capable of bearing arms, he prepared to defend the coast,11 and
utterly defeated the design of invasion. Wallingford, Windsor, and
the castle of the Peak fell before the justices.12 Archbishop Geoffrey
and Bishop Hugh laid aside their spiritual weapons and joined to

1 Hoveden, iii. 198.

1 Ibid. iii. 209.

» Will. Newb. iv. 33, p. 98 ; Hoveden,
ii. 209.

4 Hoveden, iii. 197. On Savaric,
see Epp. Cantuar. pref. pp. Ixxxvii
Ac.

» Hoveden, iii. 198.

• Hoveden, iii. 209. Oir. Camb.
V. Galfr. 408. W. Newb. iv. 83,

p. 97.

' Hoveden, iii. 204. W. Newb. iv.
33, p. 98.

8 Gervase, 1582.

• Hoveden, iii. 206.

10 Gervase, 1581. Hoveden, iii. 205.

11 Gervase, 1581.

" Hoveden, iii. 207, 208. Gervase,
1582. W. Newb. iv. 84, p. 100.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN 253

besiege Tickhill.1 But it was not the purpose of the government to
reduce to extremity one who might any day become king. The
news of Eichard was too uncertain ; and, much against the will of
the barons, Eleanor persuaded the justiciar to conclude a truce with
John from May to November.2

By this measure time and peace were gained for the compassing Measures
of the king's redemption. This had been, of course, the earliest Richard's
thought in the archbishop's mind. Before John had begun hos-
tilities, he had called a council of bishops and barons to Oxford for
the 28th of February,3 whilst Savaric was on his way to the imperial
court, and before it was actually known that Henry VI. would
require a ransom. What was done at this assembly we are not
told ; probably the difficulties occasioned by John's behaviour may
have prevented its being held, or anything else of the kind being
contemplated before the arrival of the ministers who had been in
communication with the king. On the 20th of April Hubert Walter Return of
landed with authentic news,4 and it was his mediating influence, waiter
probably, that induced the contending parties to make the six
months' truce. A few days later arrived a letter from the king,
dated April 19th, stating that the sum of 70,000 marks was required
for his liberation.5 To raise this the justices demanded an aid of a
fourth part of all revenue, lay and clerical, with an equal sum to be
levied on personal property, and a scutage of 20 shillings on the ^oney
knight's fee : all the wool of the Gilbertines and the gold and silver the ransom
of the churches.6 Whilst this was in process of collection — for no
time was lost about it — arrived the golden bull of the emperor,
brought by William Longchamp, and delivered by him to the queen
and justiciar at S. Alban's.7

Notwithstanding his high credentials and the assurance given Arrival of
by the king's letter that he still possessed his confidence, his very as the Mug's
approach revived all the angry feelings of the barons. Before land- eavoy
ing he had been obliged to swear that he would attempt to transact
no business but that of the king's release. During his stay in
London he had, however, ordered the seizure of some houses
belonging to the bishop of Coventry, who was in open rebellion, and HIS bena-
this produced such an outcry against him on the part of the citizens London
that the interview between him and the court could not be held in
the capital.8 At S. Alban's he was not more welcome. 'I come,' he His treat-
said, ' not as a justice, not as chancellor, not as legate, simply as ITbaifs

1 Hoveden, iii. 206, 207. 31, p. 109.

2 Gervase, 1582. « Hoveden, iii. 210.

s Hoveden, iii. 197. 7 Gir. Camb. V. Galfr. 403. Hove-

4 Gervase, 1582. den, iii. 211, 212.

s Hoveden, iii. 209. W. Newb. iv. 8 Gir. Camb. 403.

254

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEUEN

He retiree In

Loogchamp
recalled by

Hk-luml

He nego-
tiate* peace
with Philip

Hubert
Walter and
others ap-
pointed to
collect the
ransom

Ransom
raised to
1BO.OOO
marks

Turn of
affairs in
Long-
chauip'a
favour

bishop and the king's messenger.' ' But the chief justiciar refused
him the kiss of peace ; when he demanded the hostages, as he was
specially accredited to do, the queen refused to intrust to him her
grandson William of Winchester,2 and the principal nobles declined
to put their children in his power. Intensely chagrined, he contented
himself with declaring the king's message and summoning the barons
whose presence was required by Richard in Germany.3

Richard had empowered his chancellor to undertake this task,
probably as a demonstration of his own confidence in him, but he
was not inclined to risk anything more ; and fearing that his con-
duct might offend the barons, summoned him hastily to his side
again. He was present with him at Worms on the 29th of
June,4 and a few days after negotiated a truce with Philip at Mantes,
July 9.5 A meeting had been arranged between Philip and Henry
for June 24, at Vaucouleurs, the usual trysting-place for the emperors
and kings of France,6 but many circumstances happened to pre-
vent it, and this truce, which was observed no better than the en-
gagement to meet, was probably a substitute for it.

In the meantime Hubert Walter had, on the 80th of May, been
elected archbishop of Canterbury,7 and to him, the bishop of London
the treasurer, and the mayor Henry FitzAylwin, with William of
Arundel and Hameline of Warren 8 — two men who had never
wavered in their support of the chancellor — the care of the money
to be raised for the ransom was committed. The date of the assem-
bly at S. Alban's cannot be fixed, but it was probably early in June.
In the treaty of Worms, at the end of the same month, the emperor
raised his terms. The sum required now was more than doubled ;
150,000 marks were to be paid, of which 20,000 were to be the share
of Duke Leopold.9 A new budget was therefore necessary, but
100,000 marks being paid and hostages given, the arrangement of the
new taxes was left until the king's arrival. Under the skilful hand
of Hubert Walter everything was now concluded with facility ; the
autumn was devoted to the collection of the subsidies.10 John was
away in France, whither he had gone again as soon as he had heard
from Philip that the 'devil was unloosed.'" Philip himself was
busy with his matrimonial difficulties. The chancellor was in attend-
ance on his master, who had, moreover, summoned to him most of

1 Hoveden, iii. 212. Longchamp
seems to have been fond of distin-
guishing his own several capacities.
We may compare his speech when he
arrested Hugh de Puiset aa given by
Richard of Devizes : ' ego te oapio,
non prffisul prmsulem, sed cancellarius
cancellarium.' R. Dev. 13.

7 Son of Henry the Lion. Gir.
Camb. 403.

Hoveden, iii. 212.
Tbid. iii. 215. s Ibid. iii. 217.
Ibid. iii. 212. ' Gervase, 1584.
Hoveden, iii. 212.
Ibid. iii. p. 215, 216.
1 Ibid. iii. 225. " Ibid. iii. 216.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN 255

the other uneasy spirits, the ambitious and officious Savaric, and
even Hugh of Nunant, among the number.1 The hopes of Long-
champ's party began to revive ; his brother Henry was released from
prison,2 and, by a zealous attempt at poetic justice, Matthew de Cleres
ventured to arrest and imprison the bishop of Coventry on his way
to the continent with bags crammed with peace-offerings for Richard.3
The process of excommunication had to be resorted to again to obtain
his release.

The negotiations between Richard and John were carried on, Henego-
strange to say, through the chancellor,4 who seems to have done his between
best to effect a reconciliation. John was prevailed upon to swear johuard "
fealty to his brother, but the arrangement was defeated by the barons
of Normandy, who refused to give up the castles of his honours in
that province, and he returned in disgust to Philip to plot with him
the longer detention of the king.5 Before the end of the year
Richard summoned his mother, the justiciar, and the chancellor to
Mentz, and as the absence of the justiciar from England practi- Hubert
cally vacated his office, he nominated the archbishop of Canterbury made chief
in his place.6 Hubert had indeed been at the head of the govern-
ment since his return in April ; he maintained the royal authority
until the king's return against the frantic opposition of John's
supporters, and had recovered all the castles except Nottingham and
Tickhill before Richard's arrival.

Here, however, the administration of Walter of Coutances, and End oMhe
the period of political and personal strife, end. The interest of the turn of'

Walter of

remainder of the reign is constitutional rather than political, and I oontances
shall attempt in the preface to the fourth volume of this chronicle
to give a brief survey of it. At present it may not be uninteresting
to state the later fortunes of some of the actors who appear no more
after the conclusion of the period.

Hugh de Puiset, after the capture of Tickhill, presented himself ^"j is"
to Richard at Nottingham, and was received with great show of p".ghtde
affection.7 A few days later he attended the royal council at Not-
tingham, and after quarrelling at Selston with the King of Scots
about lodgings — a thing which he had done once before with Henry
II. — he drew down on himself a sharp rebuke from Richard.8
Partly in consequence of the king's coolness, he surrendered the county

1 Hoveden, iii. 226. 5 Hoveden, iii. 228.

2 Rot. Pip. 5 Ric. I. :— ' Henricus • R. de Diceto, 671. Hoveden, iii.
de Longocampo reddit computum de 226.

anno tertio Regis Ricardi, qui dilatus 7 Hoveden, iii. 239.

fuit propter captionem.' 8 V. S. Godrici, p. 178. Hoveden,

s R. de Diceto, 671. Gir. Camb. 404. iii. 246.

4 Hoveden, iii. 227.

256

TlIE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

Death of
Haphdu
Putot

Kurtiinr- of
hi* *on

Later his-
tory of
Hnghof
Nnuant

of Northumberland.1 Scarcely, however, had he done this when he-
repented, and offered the king, as soon as he had gone to Normandy,
two thousand marks for its restoration. When Hugh Bardulf
demanded possession, the bishop declined to surrender until he had
his answer from Richard. Hugh Bardulf, having consulted the king,
took possession of the county and exacted, moreover, the 2,000
marks as well as the surrender of the manor of Sadberge.2 In Septem-
ber we find him at York annulling the archbishop's sentence against
the canons.3 On Ash Wednesday 1195, he was there again, con-
firming the sentence passed by the dean against Geoffrey's party.*
This was his last public act. On leaving York he fell ill at Crayke,5
but persevered in riding on to Doncaster ; from Doncaster he was
taken in a boat to Howden, where, on the 3rd of March, he closed
his uneasy although magnificent career.6 His son Henry survived
him several years. He was in difficulties in 1198.7 In 1201 he
went, as so many of his forefathers had done, to Palestine,8 but, unlike
them, he lived to return. He died in or before 1212, and as his
estates escheated to the crown, we may conclude that he left no issue.9
Hugh of Nunant despaired, as well he might, of Richard's
clemency ; not only was he known to be in the secret of all John's
schemes, but his brother Robert had actually been the emissary who
proposed the continuance of the king's imprisonment and refused to
be a hostage for him on the ground of his being John's liegeman.10
One of Richard's first acts after his liberation was to arrest Robert
and order Hugh to stand his trial in the clerical as well as in the
secular courts, as bishop as well as sheriff. In the council of
Nottingham he failed to appear, and was summoned again on the 81st
of March 1194.11 The suit of the monks against him was being
prosecuted in the Curia Regis. He was allowed by the king to pur-
chase his pardon and restoration for 5,000 marks,13 in March 1195 ;
but Robert was still imprisoned, under the careful superintendence
the lady Richenda, at Dover, where he died.13 The bishop sinks into
obscurity from henceforth ; although his suit with the monks lasted
his life, it is uncertain whether he ever returned to England. He
seems to have hung about the court until his death. In February
1198, Archbishop Hubert restored the monks of Coventry, and in

1 Hoveden, iii. 249.

-• Ibid. iii. 261.

' Ibid. iii. 272, 273.

4 Ibid. iii. 284.

1 W. Newb. v. 310, p. 145.

8 Hoveden, iii. 284. W. Newb.,
p. 146.

7 Madox, Hist. Exch. p. 366.

1 Pat. 3 John, p. 3 : — ' Concessimus
quodjHenricus de Puteaco, qui crusiatUB

eat, possit invadiare quas voluerit
terrarum suarum."

• Cart. 5 John, p. 126. He has a
confirmation of the manor of Witton
from the king in 1204.

10 Rot. Claus. 14 John, p. 124.

11 Hoveden, iii. 233.
'• Ibid. iii. 241, 242.
" Ibid. iii. 287.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN 257

March Bishop Hugh died at Bee Hellouin, condemning himself to His death
purgatory until doomsday.

Of Longchamp's other opponents it is satisfactory to find that Richard's
they were treated by Richard exactly as his minister had intended,
and this, perhaps, shows that the king had exercised over his move-
ments a closer supervision than was suspected. The bishop of
Winchester was, after the council of Nottingham, disseized of his
castle and county, and lost with them a large part of his inheritance.1
Gerard Camville was deprived at the same time of Lincoln Castle and
county, and put on his defence for the charges brought against him
by the chancellor. He recovered the king's favour for 2,000 marks,
and on John's accession became a greater man than ever.2 His wife
Nicolaa stood also so high in John's estimation that on her husband's
death she was appointed sheriff or custos of Lincolnshire in 1216.3
The Yorkshire knights also had to raise much larger sums than they
expected, to recover the king's goodwill.4

The fates of the several members of the Longchamp family were Fate of
various. Stephen, the steward of Normandy, the friend and companion Longchamp
of Kichard, survived his master, and on the loss of Normandy by John,
after some attempts to maintain his possessions in both countries,
went over to Philip.5 He was slain, fighting for Philip, at the battle of
Bouvines.6 Henry, the sheriff of Herefordshire, after his release from Henry

Longchamp

prison, appears as sheriff of Worcestershire from 1195 to 1198 ; but
after the death of the chancellor both he and his sons seem to have
fallen under the king's displeasure.7 The last we hear certainly of him
is during the fourth crusade. He had placed his estates, before his
departure, in the king's keeping,8 and is mentioned by Villehardouin9 as
joining the Flemish knights who passed through Piacenza and took
the route of Apulia, instead of starting from Venice. He died in 1204,10
and the next year the king confirmed the gift of the castle of Wilton
to another Henry the son of Hugh ; u of his two sons, William, the His S011S

1 Hoveden, iii. 246. Baronage, 594.

2 Hoveden, iii. 242. « Rot. Pat. 4 John, p. 11.

3 Rot. Pat. 18 John, p. 199. 9 Villehardouin (ed. Du Cange),

4 The citizens of York had to pay 200 p. 21.

marks to prove their joy at the king's 10 On the 23rd of March 1204,

return. ' Cives Eboracenses r. c. de Matilda, his widow, had from the king

cc. marcis de dono suo pro gaudio an allowance of 101. out of the manor

adventus domini regis de Alemannia.' of Wilton. Rot. de Liberate, pp. 84,

Rot. Pip. 6 Ric. I. 106.

5 Stapleton, Norman Bolls, ii. cxv. » Rot. Cart. 6 John, p. 146. The

6 Rigord, ed. Pithou, 217 ; he is charter especially names the grantee
called ' miles probus et fidei integrse,' of Wilton, Henry the son of Hugh,
p. 219. Fighting, besides him, was We may ask how it was that Henry's
William des Barres, Richard's com- own sons did not succeed him. In
panion in the crusade : ' Willelmus answer, I can only suggest either that
Barren sis flos militum.' he himself held Wilton only as

7 Rot. Pip. 9 Rich. I. Dugdale's guardian of his nephew, or that his

S

258

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

O»bcrt
Longchamp

Robert
Longcbamp

Cteoffrey

Loug-chauip

Later years
of the
chancellor

husband of the heiress of Croun, died before him. Osbert, after being
sheriff of Norfolk and Suffolk in 1194, was, with his brother,
in disgrace in 1198,1 and no more is heard of him, except in private
charters, until his death in 1207, when his wife Avellina paid a fine
not to be compelled to marry again, and for the wardship of his heirs.2
His family continued in Kent until the end of the century.3 Robert,
the monk of Caen, whom the chancellor made prior of Ely, and to
whom the king, after his death, in grateful remembance gave the
abbey of S. Mary at York, survived until 1289. A nephew named
Geoffrey, son of Hugh and brother of the lord of Wilton, was among
the barons who compelled John to grant the charter.4 The lord of
Wilton died in 1212,s and his grand-daughter brought the castle of
the Longchamps into the house of Grey.6

The chancellor seems to have retained or regained Richard's full
confidence and kept his office until his death. During the few years
that succeeded Richard's return, he was in constant attendance upon
him. Richard had reconciled him with his most formidable enemies
before they quitted England, and it is probable that he never

sons, if he had any surviving, had lost
their title by joining Philip, as their
uncle Stephen had done. His
daughter-in-law Petronilla had claims
of dower on the Wilton estate, which
seems to prove to a certainty that he
himself had held it. William his son
was dead in 1203. Rot. Pat. 37.
Madox, Hist. Exch. p. 68.

1 In the 3rd of John, Gilbert Fitz-
Rainfrai was in trouble, ' quia ivit in
foresta cum Osberto de Longocampo.'
Rot. Cane. 3 John, p. 119, 218. Rot.
Pip. 10 Rich. I., Kent. ' Osbertus de
Longocampo reddit compotum pro
habenda gratia regis etsaisina omnium
terrarum et catallorum de quibus dis-
saisitus fuit per praeceptum regis
secundum judicium curias regis, si
quis cum eo inde loqui voluerit, sed
respomlit infra partes Herefordiae in
Wallia.'

2 Rot. Pip. 9, 10 John. Walter
Tiwe had bought the marriage for 400
marks ; Avellina bid 500 and was
relieved from the obligation to marry
him.

1 Osbert de Longchamp held the
manor of Ovenhelle in Kent by ser-
jeanty in the reign of Edward I.
Hasted, ii. 129. And his name occurs
in the parliamentary writs, vol. i.

4 This Geoffrey was the husband of
Isabella, daughter of Henry de Mineriis
of Westbury in Gloucestershire, Rot.

Claus.345. His estate was at Eston. He
was with John's enemies in 1216 (Rot.
Glaus. 279). His land was of the fee
of Walter de Lacy (Rot. Claus. 241).

4 He married Maud, the sister of
William Cantelupe, who had the ward-
ship of the heirs. He was with John's
army in Ireland in 1210. Rot.
Liberate, anno 12 Job.

* To make an end of the Long-
champs. The identity of the family
with that of Wilton I have, I think,
established in the notes. It would be
a most extraordinary thing if Here-
fordshire contained two families of
exactly the same names and both
holding lands under the Lacies. It is
of Hugh de Lacy that Hugh de Long-
champ held in Wilton in 1168; from
Walter de Lacy that Stephen held
Frome Herbert, and Geoffrey his land
at Kempley ; and in close connexion
with them he was a benefactor of
Acornbury. (8th Report of Dep.
Keeper, App. ii. pp. 136, 137.) Again
Hugh, the nephew of William the
chancellor, is closely connected with
the Watervilles and Dives. (Eyton,
Shropshire, ix. 77.) This Hugh was
son of Henry (Rot. Fin. 6 John),
and brother therefore of William ;
both of them had lands in Lincoln*
shire. Hugh married Georgia,
daughter of Henry de Coluniburiis,
Rot. Pip. 3 John.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN 259

returned to the country where he had suffered so much. Anyhow,

he passes away entirely from English history. He died at Poictiers

in 1196, whilst on a journey to Kome to defend the king against the His death, iu

archbishop of Rouen. At Poictiers he was not unpopular, if we may 11%

believe that the cross of S. Martial wept a flood of tears at the

moment of his death. He was buried in the abbey of S. Mary du

Pin, whose abbot Miles had been his fellow courtier for many

years.1

The restless career of Geoffrey of York cannot be here oven
entered on. The process by which he was being developed from his Geoffrey or
early quarrelsome violence into the character of a defender of 5
constitutional liberties must have been now advancing, but its
ripening belongs to the age of John.

Walter of Coutances remains. He also, as he advanced in years,
sank the character of a statesman in that of an ecclesiastic. In waiter of
1196 he had a terrible quarrel with Richard and laid Normandy
under an interdict, which the king bought off by an exchange of
lands, giving for the land at Andely on which his Chateau Gaillard
was built, an estate which suited the archbishop better. Walter of
Coutances acquiesced readily in the transfer of allegiance to Philip,
and died the ' pater patrite ' in 1207.

1 Hoveden. Itin. R. R. pref. xxxiii, xxxiv.

s 2

THE CHKONICLE OF ROGER OF
HOVEDEN. VOL. IV.

[!N this Preface the reign of Richard I. is agnin dealt with. Special
attention is given to ' the history of Archbishop Geoffrey of York, the
legal and political administration of Hubert Walter and Geoffrey
FitzPeter.' Light is also thrown upon ' foreign history by the more
careful notices of events which took place during the period in Italy,
Germany, Norway, and Spain.' In all of his writings Hoveden devotes
considerable attention to the history of the See of York. In the present
Preface Bishop Stubbs gives a very valuable account of the constitutional
policy of Hubert Walter. The Judicial Iter of 1194 and the Carucage of
1198 are fully described, and their relation to the measures of Henry II.
explained.]

Condition
of the
province of
York in the
t welf th and
thirteenth
centuries

I. The religious and ecclesiastical condition of the province of
York during the twelfth century was anomalous and extremely criti-
cal. The country had never recovered the savage cruelties to which
it was subjected by the Conqueror. Northumbria had been one of the
best and earliest consolidated kingdoms of the Heptarchy, her kings the
bravest and holiest, her missionaries the most devoted ; her monas-
teries had kept up European learning in the darkest age, her
mariners and merchants were enterprising, her population equally
and abundantly diffused. Archaeological discovery testifies to a
populousness and a civilisation that history seems almost to have
forgotten. Under the Danish invasion Yorkshire had gone through
no more severe experiences than Middle England ; the Angle popula-
tion coalesced with the Danish immigrants ; the lands changed their
owners and the villages their names, but the changes were in analogy
and in proportion to the usual rule. The conquerors were converted
and civilised ; but whilst they presented in some respect a marked con-
trast with the men of the south, the social condition of the country was
not very different from what it had been, or from the rest of England.
The phantom kings of Danish Northumbria rose and fell under the
alternate pressure of West Saxon suzerainty, or recurring invasion
from Scandinavia. The archbishop, by far the more permanent

THE CHRONICLE OF EOGEE OF HOVEDEN 261

institution of the two, vindicated in practice his independence of his
southern brother, and not unfrequently represented his province as a
distinct nationality from that of Canterbury.

During the century before the Conquest the political condition Previous
of the northern primacy had been materially varied. The inclusion Northum-
of Nottinghamshire, a Mercian county, within the diocese of York,
made the archbishop a regular member of the Witenagemot of the
West Saxon dynasty, and the hold thus given was, by the royal
policy, strengthened by suffering the archbishop to hold the exten-
sive bishopric of Worcester in commendam.1 The adhesion of York- Desolation

under Wil-

shire to the West Saxon race of kings was secured far more by the iiam the
archbishops of York than by the ealdormen of Northumbria ; and
notwithstanding many drawbacks from internal quarrels, and the
threatening growth of the power of the Scots, the district enjoyed an
average tranquillity and comparative wealth and prosperity until the
terrible invasion of 1069. What William then left undone was
completed by Malcolm and Cospatric in 1070. The ambition and
turbulence of the Norman earls and the savage inroads of the Scots
prolonged the desolation until the accession of Henry I. Henry put Kestoratiou
an end to the ravages of the Scots, took advantage of the forfeitures Henry L y
the Mowbrays to endow a less dangerous body of nobles and
attempted to restore here as elsewhere so much of the ancient politi-
cal system as was capable of resuscitation.

But the ecclesiastical organisation had suffered as deeply as the Caries to
social, and in the process of restoration neither church nor state had orgauis
much choice of means and instruments. The old border sees of
Whithern and Hexham had been extinct for centuries. The
archbishop exercised, or rather claimed to exercise, his jurisdiction
in the north-western counties through the archdeacons of Richmond,
under whose ineffective rule the church was impoverished and demoral-
ised. Nearer the centre the work of restoration was undertaken by
the Cistercians ; but of the prelates to whom the Norman kings
intrusted the see of York, the first Thomas was mainly occupied in

1 The connexion of Worcester and see. Aldred, who succeeded Living in

York seems to have begun with S. 1045, became archbishop of York in

Oswald, who retained the former see, 1061 ; Sampson, the first Norman

to which he had been consecrated, on bishop of Worcester, was brother of

his promotion to York in 972. Aldulf, Thomas I., archbishop of York ;

his successor, held the two together Thomas II., archbishop of York, was

until his death in 1002 ; and Wulfstan, son of Sampson, bishop of Worcester,

the next archbishop, retained Worces- The church of S. Oswald at Gloucester

ter until 1016, when Leofsi was ap- was a peculiar of York, and the cause

pointed as bishop. On Leofsi's death of one of the quarrels of Richard of

Brihteage, nephew of archbishop Canterbury with Archbishop Roger.

Wulfstan, was appointed, in 1033 ; his The close connexion subsisted in one

successor Living and Archbishop'Elfric shape or another for at least 150

then contested the possession of the years.

202

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGKIl OF HOVEDEN

The arch-
blahop*
from the
Oonqtxwt
onwnnU

Relapse
miller Ste-
phen

Disputed
election of
archbishop

a struggle with Canterbury, and seems to have lived most frequently
at Gloucester ; Gerard, his successor, was a mere courtier, and
Thomas II., a pious man, did not live long enough to produce any
marked result. Thurstan, the fourth archbishop after the Conquest,
devoted himself heart and soul to the revival of religion and of the
arts of peace. Thurstan was the great patron of the Cistercians, on
whom likewise the nobles, rich in land if poor in money, lavished
enormous territorial grants, and the Cistercians, not only by their
devotion to the religious improvement of their dependents, but
by their attention to sheep-farming and grazing, which only could
make their estates remunerative in the thinness of the reduced
population, laid posterity under a double debt. It was under
Thurstan's primacy, moreover, that the see of Carlisle was founded
and that of Whithern revived ; the former to undertake a substan-
tive share in church government ; the latter perhaps to enable the
primate to extend the benefit of episcopal work to the remoter por-
tions of his enormous diocese.

No sooner, however, was this measure of policy adopted than it
was defeated, and the work thrown back for twenty years. The
occupation of Northumberland and Cumberland by the Scots co-
incided in point of time with the paralysis of church government at
York, arising from the disputed election of S. William and Henry
Murdac. During these years the lands in Scottish hands had no
effective spiritual supervision. The Scottish church was disabled
for the work by deficiencies of organisation, which, already apparent,
went on increasing in importance until it fell before the comparative
life and order of the Calvinistic reformation. The bishop of Carlisle
was only occasionally allowed to visit his diocese, and after his death
sixty- two years elapsed before a successor could be prevailed on to
accept the see. In Yorkshire S. William was supported by the
party of Stephen and his brother the legate ; Henry Murdac by the
Cistercian interest, backed not only by the archbishop of Canterbury
but by S. Bernard himself, and all-powerful at Rome. The better
title and the wiser influence were arrayed against each other. Mur-
dac held the see as long as he lived. The restoration of S. William,
and the promotion of Hugh de Puiset, who was, like himself, a
nephew of Stephen, were probably parts of the general scheme of
pacification that belongs to the year 1158. But whilst the princes
were struggling the church was perishing, and the degradation of
the latter was accomplished when Osbert of Bayeux, who had been
archdeacon to Thurstan ' and Murdac, having poisoned the arch-

1 Osbert was of Bayeux, Thurstan's
own town. Mon. Angl. vi. 205. He
had a son called William of Bayeux,

who was at law with the canons of
York in 1191. Rot. Pip. 8 Rich. I.

THE CHEONICLE OF EOGEE OF HOVEDEN 263

bishop in the Eucharistic chalice, claimed and obtained immunity as
a clergyman from the vengeance of the outraged law.

The reign of Henry II. witnessed the restoration of the lost Restoration
counties and of the territorial completeness of the province. It was, °m°lrei
with the exception of one considerable struggle, a period of peace for '
the north country. The chair of Paulinus was filled by the active Archbishop
and clever Eoger of Pont 1'Eveque, and that of Durham by Hugh
de Puiset, of whom his worst enemies could not say that he was either
indolent or avaricious. Both these prelates showed much zeal and
considerable constructive power in their administration : both, how-
ever, were builders of castles rather than of churches, and church-
builders rather than missionaries.1 The distant portions of Roger's
diocese scarcely felt his rule at all ; the nearer were planted with
prebendal churches, and brought up to the ordinary standard of the
southern dioceses. Craven was, however, still left to the Cistercians ;
Richmondshire, Lancashire, and Westmoreland to the absentee
archdeacons ; the North Riding was full of peculiars of the church of
Durham, ancient demesnes of S. Cuthbert, which had been reclaimed
from the prevailing desolation. And Roger, moreover, was a courtier occupations
and a lawyer ; he had his quarrels with Becket to carry to their £* ^ Pri-
wretched end ; he was the greatest power in Yorkshire, and on him
the organisation of defence depended as much as that of Durham
and Northumberland on the palatine earl-bishop. The importance
of the sheriffdom of Yorkshire was so great that it was generally
intrusted to the prime minister of the Crown, the chief justiciar, as
the most trusty of the baronage, and in his constant absence the real
burden of counsel, if not of authority, fell on the primate.

The close connexion of the archbishop with the court had the fur- Appoiut-
ther effect of filling all the posts of importance in the northern church absentees
with royal officials, who were absentees and unpriestly, if not irre-
ligious, men. And this evil was aggravated during the long vacancy Long
that followed the death of Archbishop Roger in 1181. Henry's S£Sf0£r
reasons for prolonging this vacancy can only be guessed at ; but it ^i,r's
seems probable that he was influenced partly by the large revenue
which he was enabled to draw into the exchequer,2 partly by an

1 William of Newburgh's sketch of 2 The proceeds of the archiepiscopal

Archbishop Eoger is admirable ; it is, estates were let at ferm in 1189 for

however, too long to quote. He, like 1,0561. 9s. 4cZ. ; the amount of synodals

his successor Geoffrey, is charged with was 29L 18s. 8d. besides, and there were

appointing beardless boys to prebends ; other windfalls. The ferm in 1185

with speaking contemptuously of was 1,112Z. 2,s. KM. The see was

monks ; he was a good husband to his vacant for eight years, so that the

see, but with wonderful blindness benefit accruing to the exchequer

thought that he could ' obsequium from the vacancy must have been

prsestare Deo ' by posthumous benefac- nearly 10,OOOZ. Madox, Hist. Exch.

tions, when he had neglected to lay 211 ; Pipe Eoll of Eich. I. p. 9.
up treasure in heaven. Lib. iii. cap. 3.

264

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF IIOVEDEN

Attempts at
an election

The king's
reasons for

rcfiisin.' to
ratify the
election

Nomination
of Geoffrey
to the gee of
York

Composition
of the chap-
ter at thla
time

aversion to bestow upon any of his clerical ministers a preferment
which might involve a second struggle, such as that with Becket had
been ; partly by an indistinct intention of somehow providing for
his faithful son Geoffrey. The course of action adopted was, how-
ever, very prejudicial to Geoffrey's interests ; the prolongation of
the vacancy being itself a great source of disturbance to the province,
and the ecclesiastics who were promoted being of the class most
likely to be jealous of a new archbishop, and especially of such a one
as Geoffrey. Geoffrey's troubles were thus created for him long
before he had any certain prospect of the archiepiscopate, and the
circumstances under which he was promoted to it were untoward in
an extreme degree.

In September 1186, Henry II., in a court at Marlborough,1 pro-
posed to the assembled canons of York the election of a new arch-
bishop ; and they nominated five persons for royal approval. These
were Hubert Walter the dean, Haino the precentor, Bernard prior of
Newburgh, Laurence archdeacon of Bedford, and Master Roger
Arundel ; the two last were ministers of the Exchequer, who
had at the time the management of the archiepiscopal revenue.*
Henry refused all five, as he had in the preceding May declined to
sanction the election of Richard FitzNeal, Godfrey de Lucy, and
Herbert the Poor to the see of Lincoln ; on that occasion alleging
that all these candidates were rich enough already, and that for the
future he would never give a bishopric to any one for love or relation-
ship, counsel, prayer, or price, but to those whom the Lord should
choose.3 It was no doubt from something like a religious sense of
right that he promoted Hugh of Lincoln and Archbishop Baldwin, but
his other nominations both before and after this date can scarcely be
reconciled with this declaration.

Nothing more was done in the matter until the king's last illness,
when he nominated his son Geoffrey. During this time the ministers
of the Exchequer received the temporalities of the see, Hubert Walter
as dean had the care of the spiritualities,4 and the episcopal func-
tions were discharged by the bishop of Durham, who as a principal
member of the church of York seems to have claimed certain unde-
fined rights in the cathedral body, if not also a voice in the election
of the metropolitan analogous with that which the southern bishops
still occasionally exercised in the elections to Canterbury.5

Very much of the interest of the subsequent history depends on
the character and position of the canons of the chapter at this time.

1 Ben. Pet. i. 352.

J William le Vavaasur was joined in
the commission with them. Madox,
Hist. Exch. 211 ; Pipe Roll of Rich. 1.

p. 9.

1 Ben. Pet. i. 346.

4 Hoveden, iii. 7.

5 Hoveden, iii. 7.

Ben. Pet. ii. 78.
Ben. Pet. ii. 77.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

265

At the head of it was Hubert Walter, the nephew and chaplain of
Ranulf Glanvill, justiciar of England and sheriff of Yorkshire. He of
course was non-resident, having been generally in attendance on the
king, either as the representative of the justiciar who remained in
England whilst Henry was abroad, or in some capacity connected
with the business of the Chancery.1 Hubert was a man, as his Hubert
later history showed, of great ability in affairs, a well- trained and dean
most practical statesman, and a thoroughly English minister to a
thoroughly un-English king. It is in his relationship to Archbishop
Geoffrey that the worst side of his character comes out. As having
been elected to the see in 1186, and being in possession, as dean, of
the spiritualities, he seems to have regarded himself as having a
claim upon the archiepiscopate which the promotion of Geoffrey of
course would disappoint. The power which he had in the chapter
and diocese in these two capacities was exercised in his absence by
his official, Master Bartholomew.2 Next in importance, though not The arch-
in dignity, after the dean, were the archdeacons ; Ralph, of the West
Riding, of whom we know no more than transpires from his subse-
quent conduct to Geoffrey ; Geoffrey Muschamp,3 of Cleveland, who
afterwards was bishop of Lichfield ; and William Testard, of
Nottingham. The archdeaconry of the East Riding was annexed,
it would seem, to the treasurership.4 The archdeaconry of
Richmond, one of the most wealthy and influential posts in the the"cnapter
English church, was filled by Godfrey de Lucy, the son of the late
justiciar Richard de Lucy,5 whom we find to have been in constant

deacons

The great
dignities of

1 Hubert was made dean on the
death of Robert Butevilein in 1186 ;
only a short time before he was elected
to the archbishopric. He attests the
king's letters dated at Guildford early
in 1187 (Epp. Cant. p. 28). In 1189
he was in attendance on the king in
Maine, and apparently had the royal
seal at his disposal (Epp. Cant. pp.
282, 283, 284). William of S. Mere
1'Eglise, who succeeded to his prebend
at York in 1189, is called the king's
protonotary, and it is possible that
Hubert held the office before him, or
that he acted as vice-chancellor under
Geoffrey, as Walter of Coutances had
done. His connexion with the chan-
cery under whatever title must have
brought him into early intercourse
with Geoffrey, and probably produced
the personal jealousy which so much
affects their later relations.

2 Hoveden. iii. 7. Benedict, ii. 77.

3 Geoffrey Muschamp was probably
appointed by Henry II. just before his

death, as his nomination is one of
those said to be fraudulently sealed by
Geoffrey as chancellor, and as his pre-
decessor Jeremiah is mentioned in the
Pipe Roll of 1 Rich. I. Hoveden, iii.
274.

4 This is an inference from the fact
that no archdeacon of the East Riding
is mentioned in these disputes, and
that the churches which are specified by
Hoveden as being in the treasurer's
archdeaconry are situated in the East
Riding. Hugh de Puiset seems to have
held it with the treasurership, and,
as Hoveden was locally within it, it
was no doubt an additional reason for
his wish to strengthen the family
interest there, by obtaining it for his
nephew Bouchard. The first person
known as archdeacon of the East
Riding by that name is Walter of
Wisbech, in 1218. Hoveden, ii. 70.
Le Neve, ed. Hardy, iii. 141.

5 Ben. Pet. i. 334.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

Geoffrey tbe
tmrav -

Hamo the
precentor

Permanence
of hereditary
interest
among the
canons

Other chap-
ters of

•vinous

employment during Henry's reign in the judicial and financial work
of the Exchequer, and who is known to us under Richard as bishop
of Winchester, alternately the friend and victim of William
Longchamp. Of the great dignities of the chapter, the treasurership
was held by Geoffrey himself, the king's son ; he had received it on
the promotion of Ralph Warneville, his predecessor in the chancellor-
ship, together with the archdeaconry of Rouen, and probably other
important preferment.1 The treasurership was a very valuable post,
next in wealth to the deanery, and very far beyond the other
dignities. It had been held in succession by S. William, afterwards
archbishop ; Hugh de Puiset ; John of Poictiers, afterwards arch-
bishop of Lyons ; and Ralph of Warneville, the chancellor. It was
properly in the gift of the archbishop, and in fact Roger, who died
whilst the promotion of Ralph de Warneville was in contemplation,
had promised the reversion of it to the precentor Hamo,2 thus
preparing a new rival and a pertinacious one for his unlucky
successor. The chancellorship of the church was vacant. The
precentor Hamo was the only dignitary in constant residence. He
had filled the office for many years, had been nominated, as we have
just seen, by Roger to the treasurership, had been also proposed to
the king for election to the see in 1186, and seems from the later
history to have embodied all the traditions of the chapter, as well as
to have wielded all its local influence. Of the other canons only a
few names have reached us, and those are of local interest only.3
But it seems not improbable that the hereditary principle in the
tenure of these preferments still retained some vitality. The most
important ecclesiastics in Yorkshire after these seem to have been
Peter de Ros, archdeacon of Carlisle, and Roger Arundel, a canon of
Southwell and custos of the temporalities of the see. It must not
be forgotten that the archbishop had, at Ripon, Beverley, and
Southwell, three other chapters of canons well endowed and largely
leavened with influential public men. Among these it would be
strange if Roger Hoveden were not provided for ; that he was so,
however, we have no proof.

The news of Geoffrey's nomination to the archbishopric must

1 Gir. Camb. (Ang. Sac. vol. ii.), V.
Galfr. p. 380.

* Ben. Pet. ii. 88. It is added that
Henry II. bad confirmed the appoint-
ment.

1 There is a difficulty in drawing up
a regular list, because of the several
that present themselves ; it is not cer-
tain whether they held the stalls in
succession or contemporaneously.
Master Erard, William of Stigandby,

and Geoffrey Muschamp seem to have
been nominated by Henry shortly
before his death ; William of 8. Mere
1'Eglise, William of Chimeli.and Bou-
chard de Puiset by Richard at the
council of Pipewell ; Simon of Apulia
and Master Honorius by Archbishop
Geoffrey. Besides these, Peter of
Flanders held the prebend of Hus-
thwaite, Hugh Murdac was another
canon, Adam of Thornovere another.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGEE OP HOVEDEN 267

have reached England with the news of Henry's death ; and it was ,;eoffrcy-s

afterwards said that he turned the fact of his holding the great seal m" father's

to advantage, by sealing letters of collation to vacant prebends after s

his father's decease l and before the seal of the new king was made.

If the charge is true, his purpose probably was to insure himself a

certain party among the canons. Hoveden very justly remarks

upon the act as disgraceful if true ; 2 but it does not follow that The vacau-

anything was done without the direction of Henry, whose death was i>abiy fiiieii

sudden and whose last commands were confided to Geoffrey, before Ms"7

Richard seems to have had no fault to find with the nomination at

first ; Henry's promise made on the 4th or 5th of July at Chinon

was confirmed by the new sovereign at Rouen, on the occasion of

his investiture with the duchy of Normandy on the 20th of the Geoffrey's

same month,3 and Geoffrey immediately despatched his officers with confirmed11

royal letters to York to replace those of the king and the dean, and

to transact the business of the election, which must necessarily be

conducted in canonical form. So little time was lost in doing this,

that on the 10th of August the chapter assembled to make the

election.

The prospect of having such an archbishop as Geoffrey after a Election of
long interval of quasi-independence was not very welcome to the the°ohapter
York clergy ; but at first they seem to have made the best of it.
The archdeacon of Richmond, who probably saw the way to
promotion open elsewhere, sent a letter of proxy to assent to it ; '
and a sufficient number of canons present followed the lead ; but the
act was not completed without a strong protest on the part of
Master Bartholomew, the dean's official, who appealed to the pope
against the election as invalid, in consequence of the absence of his
principal, and of the bishop of Durham the only surviving suffragan.
William of Newburgh tells us that the precentor was frightened into
taking part ; "' but as we find him a little later good friends with
Geoffrey, on whose support he may have reckoned in his pursuit of
the treasurership, it is probable that he joined willingly in the
election.

Geoffrey seems to have considered that his promptness in obtaining Time lost by
canonical election superseded the necessity of further watchfulness, after the

election

1 Hoveden, iii. 274. the charge, and Geoffrey seems to have

2 That the accusation was rife seems admitted or not to have contradicted
to be shown by Giraldus, who men- it. Hoveden, iii. 274.

tions that Geoffrey immediately on his 3 Benedict, ii. 78.

father's death sealed up the great seal 4 Benedict, ii. 77. Hoveden, iii. 7.

with the seals of the barons who were 5 W. Newb. lib. iv. cap. 2. Ralph

present, and sent it to Richard (V. de Diceto also mentions that Hamo

Galfr. p. 382) , Richard himself be- published the election in place of the

lieved or found it convenient to believe absent dean, c. 653.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROOEK OF HOVEDEN

Opposition
to his .1 j i-
potutnient
by the
queen, bi-
shop Hugh,
and the
minister?

Appeal < f

Hubert

Walter

Geoffrey's
servant*
displace- 1

lie makes
good lii-
pOBition
with
iUchanl

He neglected to keep Richard in sight, and instead of following the
court to England at once, spent some weeks in visiting his estates in
Anjou and Touraine. Giraldus Cambrensis ' alleges that he was
reluctant to take orders, and so to cut himself off from a remote
chance of succession to the throne. It is possible that there may be
a grain of truth in the assertion ; that he was anxious to retain his
hold on the see of York without taking orders until it was absolutely
necessary ; it is also possible that Richard's design was to draw him
into Holy Orders by the hope of the archiepiscopate, intending, as
was afterwards done, that by means of pecuniary exactions and
enforced exile he should be disarmed of any power that the position
entitled him to. All this is, however, conjectural. The fact was
that from the very moment that his promotion was announced a large
number of influences were set to work against him. Queen Eleanor
naturally disliked her husband's natural son, whose behaviour to his
father was in such strong contrast with that of her own children.
Bishop Hugh de Puiset was very much disinclined to accept as his
superior so energetic a person as Geoffrey, and was not without
hope of obtaining the see of York for his nephew Bouchard.2 The
ministerial party, moved by Hubert Walter and represented by Ranulf
Glanvill, remonstrated against the appointment ; and the canons
who had been absent or in the minority at the election, moved also
by Hubert Walter, pushed their appeal. This appeal was formally
renewed by Hubert in the presence of five bishops, a few days after
Richard's landing, at Winchester ; and the result was the issuing of
a mandate from that place that the property, both temporal and
spiritual, of the see should remain as it was at the death of the lato
king. In consequence of this Geoffrey's servants were displaced by
those of the dean and the exchequer.3

Geoffrey, finding that he was quickly losing the hold on his
brother which the remorse consequent on his father's death had given
him, now hastened to England, met the representatives of the
chapter at London, and after a show of reluctance gave his formal
consent to the election.4 Thence he proceeded to Windsor, where
after considerable difficulties he seems to have made good his position
against all opponents, or perhaps to have outbid them in promises
made to secure the fickle favour of Richard. He appeared at the
coronation as elect of York ; 5 but the appeal probably rendered it
necessary that the process of election should be renewed, or at all
events receive papal confirmation.

At the council of Pipewell Richard attempted, by his distribution

V. Galfr. pp. 382, 383.
Ibid. p. 384.
Ben. Pet. ii. 77.

Gir. Camb. pp. 382, 333.
Benedict, ii. 79.

THE CHEONICLE OF KOGER OF HOVEDEN 269

of ecclesiastical patronage, to satisfy all the opposing interests involved ri-omotious

in this question. To Geoffrey he gave the archbishopric ; Hubert Council of

Walter was reconciled by his appointment to Salisbury ; Godfrey de

Lucy got his expected promotion at Winchester ; the bishop of

Durham obtained for Bouchard the treasurership of York, vacated

by Geoffrey, and gave his formal assent to the election of Geoffrey.1

The difficulties of the appointment were, however, complicated by the

conduct of Archbishop Baldwin, who, remembering the old strife

between York and Canterbury, forbade the consecration of Geoffrey

by any other bishop than himself. This was especially unreasonable, A!>P«U of

-r> 1 3 • 4.- t ^ n ;j n ft • ' e. Archbishop

as Baldwin was now starting for the Crusade ; Geonrey s connrma- Baldwin

tion at Eome could not be transacted before he departed, and the

king had determined that Geoffrey should not set foot in England

during his absence. Geoffrey does not seem to have been aware of ceoffreyis

this, for a week after the council he obtained priest's orders from the priest

bishop of Whithern at Southwell, and sent Adam of Thornovere to

Rome to apply for his pall ; 2 the king, however, forbade his sailing at

this time.

At this juncture a little common sense and self-restraint might HI? want of
have stood Geoffrey in good stead. He was eminently impracticable, prudence
He had for the moment got rid of his most formidable difficulties ;
his rivals were provided for by promotion, and he himself was almost
in possession. Eichard had allowed him to visit his see, and had
commissioned him to go as far as the Tweed at the head of the
baronage of Yorkshire to meet William the Lion, whom he was to
conduct to Canterbury to do homage. From Southwell he made
his way to York, where he speedily involved himself in new
troubles.

Geoffrey had been at York sixteen years before, when as elect of HIS visit to
Lincoln he had headed the king's forces against the Mowbrays in Yor
the great rebellion of 1174, and having beaten them had been
received in the ancient city in triumph.3 In that struggle he had
shown qualities that seemed beyond his years ; now, a man of
mature age, he showed a want of tact that would have been
remarkable in a boy. The promotion of Hubert Walter had vacated The new
the deanery, and the king had given it to Henry, brother of the great there**
William Marshall ; he and Bouchard de Puiset were now at York
waiting to be installed. Although the king's right to fill up the
places, which became vacant during the vacancy of the see, seems to
have been fully recognised, Geoffrey was vexed to see himself deprived
of the two best preferments in his gift ; the precentor Hamo had
already, acting in the interest of the archbishop, refused to install

1 Gir. Camb. p. 383. 2 Benedict, ii. 92.

s Gir. Camb. V. Galfr. p. 379.

270

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

Geoffrey
rofunCT to
install them

He conducts
the king of
Scot* to
Canterbury

Renewed
effort* of his
enemies

He goes to
the legate
and offends
the king

Ricliard is
reconciled

Geoffrey
goe* again
to York hi
January
1190

the now dignitaries on the ground that the right belonged to the
archbishop only. Geoffrey himself refused on the excuse that until
he was confirmed by the pope his acts would be liable to be invalidated.
The dean and treasurer hastened off to complain to the king.
Geoffrey was solemnly received in the minster, but as soon as the
news reached Richard he ordered all the lay estates of his brother
in England and France to be seized. He does not, however, seem to
have threatened his tenure of his canonical rights.

From York Geoffrey proceeded northwards, met the king of Scots,
and brought him to Canterbury, where he found Richard's attitude
extremely threatening. His enemies had improved their oppor-
tunities. Hubert Walter, although now bishop of Salisbury, renewed
his claim ; Hugh de Puiset vouched for the uncanonical character
of Geoffrey's election ; stories of Geoffrey's private behaviour were
invented and brought to Richard ; he had been used to put the cover
of a gold bowl on his head and say, ' Is not this head fit to wear a
crown ? ' and he had trodden underfoot a portrait of Richard, saying
that such a king as he ought so to be treated.1 And now the
disappointed dean and treasurer put in their word ; the man was a
murderer, the son of an adulterer and a whore,2 unworthy to be
promoted to the priesthood.

Geoffrey, again unwisely, betook himself to John of Anagni, the
papal legate, who was then at Dover, and obtained from him
confirmation in defiance of these appeals ; 3 so little did he under-
stand the nature of his brother. Richard was extremely indignant,
but there was a way in which his indignation could at any time be
assuaged. He extorted a promise from Geoffrey to pay him 2,0001. ;
the appeals were then withdrawn, the legate's confirmation recognised,
and Geoffrey's possessions, personal and official, restored. He in
his turn had to confirm the appointments of the king's nominees,
and promised to renew the covenants which his predecessor had made
with the bishop of Durham.

Again Geoffrey started for the north. The king left Dover on
December 11. Early in January the archbishop elect, the dean, and
the treasurer were at York ; and before the twelve days of Christmas
were over they were in a thicker fray than ever. On the eve of the
Epiphany the archbishop proposed to attend vespers in the minster
in state. The precentor Hamo and the other canons who were on
his side waited to receive him in procession. Whether Geoffrey was
behind time or not does not appear ; but when the procession reached
the choir they found that the candles were lighted and that the dean

1 • Supped ituri et suhjici;' the
former word certainly implying a pun.
Gir. Civmb. V. Galfr. p. 385.

* Benedict, ii. 99.
1 Gir. Camb. 384, 385.
ii. 99.

Benedict,

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN 271

and treasurer had begun the service. So marked and gratuitous an He is in-
insult roused Geoffrey at once, he commanded the choir to be silent, minsterV 6
and the precentor in a more constitutional way seconded the S^Serand
command. The order was obeyed and Geoffrey himself began to
sing the service ; thereupon the treasurer ordered the candles to be
extinguished : the management of the lights belonged to the
treasurer as much as that of the singing did to the precentor ; his
command also was obeyed, and Geoffrey finished the vespers in the
dark. When the service was over he protested loudly against the
insult, and suspended the church from Divine service until an apology
should be made him.1

Geoffrey, although impracticable, was placable enough ; on the ?e.offer:i
following day he offered to meet the dean and treasurer and to receive conciied
amends. The church was full of clergy and citizens anxious, no
doubt, to see the new archbishop and canons, as well as to witness
the issue of the struggle. The two parties met in the choir, and
Geoffrey was ready to be reconciled ; but the two dignitaries not Riot in tUe

° . minster and

only refused an apology but tried to get up a demonstration against i%"t of the

him. A riot followed ; the citizens took Geoffrey's part, and were with

difficulty restrained by him from falling on his opponents. Dismayed

at the result, they had recourse to flight ; one took refuge in the

tomb of S. William, the other in the deanery. Unhappily Geoffrey

was not now content with their discomfiture ; he excommunicated

them both and closed the church.2

This unfortunate affray defeated one of the main objects of unfortunate
Geoffrey's visit. It offended Hugh de Puiset, who, as justiciar, quences
forbade the tenants of the see to pay any money to the elect ; 3 and
it opened the eyes of the citizens to his uncertain tenure of his office,
so that it was impossible to raise a loan. He had to follow Eichard
to France without the money that he had promised. He found him
at Lions,4 about Easter, told his story, and found himself again
disseised. Not content with this, the king now sent the bishop of Richard
Bath, Reginald Fitz-Jocelin ; Nicolas, dean of S. Julian's at Le ofleuded
Mans ; and Bouchard de Puiset, to Rome to forbid his recognition
by the pope.5 For this, however, they were too late ; Clement III. Tlie P°PC

. confirms the

had already on March 7 confirmed the election and sent the pall, election
After another tedious negotiation with Richard, in the course of
which he offered to surrender the estates of the see for a yearly
pension, he obtained grace. At Vezelai he paid 800 marks down ;

1 Hoveden, iii. 31, 32. 5 Gir. Camb. p. 380.

"• Hoveden, iii. 32. 6 Ralph de Diceto, 653. The pope

3 Gir. Camb. p. 386. mentions that Alexander III. had

1 Gir. Camb. p. 386. Richard was already granted Geoffrey a dispensa-

at Lions in Easter week. Fcedera, i. tion ; from the bar, no doubt, of

51. illegitimacy.

272

THE CHRONICLE OF KOOKR OF HOVEDKN

( Jooff rey

tl»- king's
favour

He live* at
Toum, and

with Rome

The objec-
tions to hid
consecration
are with-
drawn

Precau-
tionary
measures
of the
bishop of
Durham

Geoffrey
prepares to
retain to
England

His conse-
cration,
Aug. 18,
1191

He sum-
mons the
bishop of

Durham,
who appeals
to Rome

1,0001. the king forgave him ; the balance of the debt he was to
account for at the Exchequer.1 Before he parted with Richard he had
to swear that he would not return to England within three years.
Geoffrey retired to Tours, whence ho sent his agents to Rome to
watch the proceedings of his adversaries, and, if they could not
obtain an order for his speedy consecration, to procure the cancelling
of the letters which Hugh de Puiset had obtained releasing him from
his dependence on the see of York. Geoffrey's agents on this
occasion were Simon of Apulia, an Italian lawyer, who had served
Henry II., and whom he now, or a little later, made chancellor of
York ; his friend Hamo the precentor ; William Testard, archdeacon
of Nottingham, and Ralph Wigetoft, canon of Ripon ; all of whom,
except the last, afterwards took a decided part against him.2

For a year and a quarter Geoffrey stayed at Tours. During this
time Longchamp was supreme in England ; Hugh de Puiset reduced
to insignificance, and living at Howden ; the dean and treasurer all-
powerful in York. What little action was taken in his concerns was
carried on at Rome and Messina. In April 1191 Eleanor was in-
structed by Richard to inform the pope that the objections to his
brother's consecration were removed.3 Celestine III., within a month
of his own elevation to the papacy, issued an order to the archbishop
of Tours to consecrate him, and on the llth of May authorised him
to exact from Bishop Hugh de Puiset the profession of obedience
which Clement III. had allowed him to decline.4 Of this Hugh was
immediately informed by his agents, and forthwith appealed against
it as involving a grievance to his church, placing his own person and
church, with all its members, under the special protection of the Holy
See.5 According to Giraldus, the archbishop had been released from
his promise to stay away from England for three years, before he
parted from Richard ; but the exact truth or falsehood of this state-
ment has never been cleared up.6 He now prepared for his conse-
cration and for his return home as soon as it should be completed.

He was consecrated by the archbishop of Tours in the church of
S. Maurice at Tours on the 18th of August, and received the pall
the same day from the abbot of Marmoutier.7 That done, he issued
a letter to the bishop of Durham to attend a synod of the province of
York on the Monday after Michaelmas, in which he should both

1 Gir. Camb. p. 387.

1 Gir. Camb. p. 387. William of
Newburgh also mentions Simon of
Apulia as the principal agent of the
archbishop at Rome, lib. iv. cap. 17.

1 Hoveden, iii. 100.

4 This letter is printed in the Mo-
nasticon, vi. 1188. The privilege

which Hugh had obtained from
Clement III. is described by William
of Newburgh, lib. iv. cap. 27.

* Hoveden, iii. 169. Benedict, ii.
225.

• Gir. Camb. p. 387.

7 Gir. Camb. p. 388. Ralph de
Diceto, c. 603.

THE CHEONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN 278

renew his profession and give an account of his conduct in detaining
the procurations due to the see of York from the jurisdictions of
Allertonshire and Howdenshire.1 On the receipt of this summons
Hugh again appealed to Home.

The story of the landing of Geoffrey, his imprisonment and release, His lauding,
the part he took in the humiliation of Longchamp, and the revolution nwu"Sand
that followed, need not he told here.2 He joined for a moment with
Hugh de Puiset and William Marshall in this business, but almost
before it was over the quarrel broke out again. Longchamp's de-
position took place on the 10th of October. That done, Hugh laid
his case before the bishops. Geoffrey hastened by Northampton,
where he had studied in earlier years, and was still sufficiently popular
to be welcomed with a procession, to York, where he was enthroned He goes to
with great solemnity on All Saints' day.3 Bishop Hugh failed to JT0Co^amuDi-
make his appearance, and after three citations,4 to which he replied g^shBlsbop
by three appeals, was excommunicated, Geoffrey so far disregarding
moderate counsels as to direct that the sacred vessels in which Holy
Communion was celebrated in the bishop's presence should be broken
up, as polluted.5 Hugh took up his residence again at Howden, Hughcon-

/, . ., -i r- , rn • , i i at- i I temnsthe

where John visited mm at Christmas ; he also urged his appeal at sentence
Rome. Exasperated by this contempt, Geoffrey excommunicated him excomnumi1-
a second time in more violent "terms than before, on Candlemas day catoi,Feb.2,
1192.6

Not content, apparently, with making one inveterate and powerful Appeal of
enemy, and involving himself in one suit at Eome, Geoffrey soon of^men-8
after this excommunicated the prioress of Clementhorpe for resisting thorPe
his command to reduce her little nunnery to dependence on the
distant abbey of Godstow.7 She also carried her wrongs to the pope.
The heavy hand of Geoffrey fell also on the chapter. Henry Marshall New appeal?
and Bouchard de Puiset were stimulated by the bishop of Durham to canons, and
renew their appeals, and a new quarrel emerged, the causes of which Smu^Xs
are obscure, but which alienated from the archbishop his old servant
Adam of Thornovere, Peter de Eos, the archdeacon of Carlisle, and
Hugh Murdac, another of the canons. As usual, Geoffrey excom-
municated them, and as usual, they appealed.8 Matters looked so
threatening that at Mid -Lent the queen summoned the two prelates to
London to compel them to keep the peace. They obeyed the sum- Failure of
mons ; Hugh offered to submit to the arbitration of the bishops, but attempt "at a
Geoffrey insisted that he should sue to him for absolution and promise tfonnc'
obedience. Hugh answered that if that was the archbishop's view

1 Hoveden, iii. 168, 169. ti Benedict, ii. 237.

2 See above, pp. 233-245. 7 Hoveden, iii. 188. Benedict, ii.
s Gir. Camb. p. 400. 240.

* Benedict, ii. 225, 226. » Benedict, ii. 248.

s Hoveden, iii. 169.

274 THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

he would make no peace with him unless he would publicly confess
that his sentence of excommunication was null. Geoffrey would not
hear of this, and having added to the number of his enemies the
bishop of London and other suffragans of Canterbury, whom he had
outraged by having his cross borne erect at the Temple, returned
somewhat discomfited to his own province.1

^ was Juafc at *ki8 juncture that a commission was brought from

Rome, directed to the bishops of Lincoln and Rochester and the
the bishop of abbot of Peterborough, ordering them to declare that the pope had
annulled the sentence against Bishop Hugh ; 2 and further enjoining
on them that, if on inquiry they found that the archbishop had issued
the orders for destroying the sacred vessels, the bishop should no
longer be bound to make his profession of obedience. The judges
sittings of delegate undertook to arrange this quarrel. After a hearing early in
the spring they adjourned to Midsummer day, and from Midsummer
day, as the bishop of Durham was absent from England, to the feast
of S. Calixtus.3 The other disputes Queen Eleanor and the justiciar,
Walter of Coutances, took in hand. It was necessary to send Hugh
de Puiset to France on important business ; he refused to go unless
the questions were settled. Under this stimulus they issued per-
emptory letters to Geoffrey to satisfy his discontented chapter, and
directed William Stuteville, in case of his non-compliance, to seize
the whole estates of the see.4

Apologies of It would have been madness to disobey such a monition ; for-

tunately for Geoffrey, his opponents were growing tired of the contest.

Reconcile- Bouchard de Puiset, Adam of Thornovere, Hugh Murdac, and Peter

thedigni- de Ros consented to ask formally for absolution, and Geoffrey, in

th''",ir'.n": return for the concession, reinstated them in their stalls and emolu-

ments.5 Hamo and Bouchard also under his auspices patched up an

agreement, by which they divided the revenue of the treasurership.

Bouchard was to hold it for life, unless he changed his profession or

received higher promotion ; Hamo in such case to have the re-

version of the dignity. Only the dean held out, and against him

the archbishop hurled an avalanche of curses, going so far as to

place his metropolitan city under interdict so long as it was polluted

by Henry Marshall's presence.6

1 Benedict, ii. 238. he sent back bis agents to demand

* Hoveden, iii. 170, 171. Benedict, entire independence of Geoffrey. The

ii. 245. The latter chronicle enu- same conclusion is inferred from the

merates here the privileges which language of William of Newburgh, lib.

Bishop Hugh acquired from Celestine iv. cap. 27.

III. No one was to have power to ' Hoveden, iii. 172.

excommunicate him without special ' Benedict, ii. 247.

mandate from Rome. He was not to * Benedict, ii. 248.

be required to make his profession at * Benedict, ii. 249.

all. Hugh was not satisfied with this ;

THE CHRONICLE OF EOGER OF HOVEDEN 275

At this point we lose the guidance of the Chronicle of Benedict, Reeonciiia-
and Hoveden does not immediately take up the thread of the story ; archbishop
but it would appear from a scanty notice preserved by Gervase of jjnghBinh°P
Canterbury,1 that the judges delegate arranged a reconciliation October 1192
between Geoffrey and Hugh at Northampton in October, the old
bishop consenting at last to recognise his canonical superior. The
reconciliation lasted for some time, being no doubt strengthened by
the union which was effected throughout the north against John,
who had taken up arms on the news of his brother's imprisonment.
The most obdurate of Geoffrey's opponents was also got rid of soon
after. Richard whilst in Germany nominated the dean of York to Promotion

of the dean

the see of Exeter.

Up to this time we may fairly regard Geoffrey as not more sinned Geoffrey
against than sinning. All the difficulties of his position, the pro- by Richard,
yoking attitude of his opponents, the low standard of ecclesiastical waiter, and
morality, are insufficient to excuse the wanton exercise of the awful seryTnia
weapon of excommunication. Henceforth we see him the victim, not
only of grossly unfair treatment by Richard, but of the less obvious
persistent hostility of Hubert Walter, and of cruel ingratitude on the
part of his own servants. His own conduct is as far as ever from Geoffrey's
being impeccable ; he is still a violent, intemperate, impracticable able charao
man of the world, but he has no longer to contend with opponents
whose party principles and prejudices palliate the guilt of their con-
duct towards him ; his enemies are now the men whose fortunes he
has founded, and for whom in great measure the actions have been
done which gave an excuse for the enmity of his earlier foes.

The news of Richard's imprisonment reconciled him for a time Alienation
with Hugh de Puiset, and the promotion of Henry Marshall delivered in tile chap-'
him from his greatest personal enemy in the chapter. But the
necessities of Richard's ransom compelled him to take measures
which alienated all his friends at York, whilst the negotiations for the
appointment of a new dean resulted in the conversion of his oldest
and most confidential servant into a bitter and inveterate personal
enemy, whose conduct became a precedent and excuse for a long series
of desertions. The promotion of Hubert Walter to the archbishopric ^f™"1£tei""
of Canterbury, shortly followed by his nomination to the justiciar- Waiter
ship, and a year later by his appointment as legate, placed the unfor-
tunate and imprudent Geoffrey at the mercy of an old and honourable
but still determined enemy.

Among the first persons in England to whom Richard in his Richard

r asks Geof-

great emergency applied for help in raising the ransom money was frey-s aid in
Geoffrey,2 on whom, notwithstanding his treatment of him, he felt he of his '

ransom

1 Gervase, c. 1580, 1581. - Hoveden, iii. 222.

T 2

276

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVKDKN

Refusal of
the York

• !>•: k'\ to
submit to
the exac-
tion*

They close
the mluiter
and block
oat the
archbishop

Simon of
Apulia de-
Herts him
and joins
the enemies

Dispute as
to the tilling
up the
deanery

could depend, both as his father's son, as an ally who had everything
to fear from John, and as a source of revenue which if fairly
managed would not be soon exhausted. Geoffrey showed the greatest
alacrity in taking up arms for the defence of Richard's rights ; and
with scarcely less zeal, tempered however by no slight misgivings,
he undertook to negotiate for supplies. He laid the matter of the
ransom before the Chapter of York ; ' throughout the kingdom, he said,
it had been agreed that a very great sacrifice should be made, it was
necessary that they should offer a fourth part of their annual revenue.
Hoveden, in telling the story, rises in tone for the moment to dilate
on the ingratitude of the clergy. He called, counselled, entreated
those canons with whom he had had the most friendly relations,
whom he had enriched and promoted, to do this. They at once turned
round upon him, declared that he was attempting to destroy the
liberties of his church, and that from henceforth they would have
nothing more to do with him. The threat seems to have been
literally carried out. They left him to the company of his household
servants, closed the minster, forbade the ringing of the bells, stripped
the altars, locked up the archbishop's stall in the choir, and blocked
up the door by which he entered the church from his palace. Co-
incident with this unseemly state of things arose the quarrel with
Simon of Apulia.

This unprincipled adventurer we have already seen acting as
Geoffrey's confidential servant. He had been his agent at Rome in
1190 ; he it was who commanded the archbishop's retinue when he
returned to England : 2 and Geoffrey had rewarded him with the gift
of the chancellorship of York, and even promised him the reversion
of the provostship of Beverley. In gratitude and hope alike he might
have been patient with a master whose difficulties he knew better
than anyone else. The news of Henry Marshall's appointment to
Exeter reached Geoffrey whilst he was staying at Ripon,3 and he
prepared to fill up the deanery. He had a brother named Peter,
probably, as he is not called son of Henry II., the son of his mother
by one of her other lovers. Peter had been made archdeacon of
Lincoln some years before. Geoffrey now proposed to make him dean
of York. He was, however, at Paris, and Richard had sent from
Germany an urgent letter desiring that John of Bethune, provost of
Douay and brother to the advocate Baldwin, who had accompanied
him on his return from Palestine and shared his captivity, should be
appointed. In order to avoid doing this, or leaving the preferment
open, Geoffrey consulted his two friends, Simon and Hamo, who
were with him at Ripon, and the result of the deliberation was

1 Hoveden, iii. 222.

Hoveden, iii. 221.

* Gir. Camb. p. 390.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGEE OF HOVEDEN 277

that Simon was nominated. Shortly after, when the dread of
Richard's interference had blown over, Geoffrey declared that he
intended him merely as a stopgap for his brother Peter. Simon
insisted that the appointment was bona fide, and threw himself on
the sympathy of the discontented canons, helping, no doubt, to
organise the opposition on the subject of the money grant. The simon of
chapter elected him to the deanery, and then Geoffrey, attempting to elected by
disarm Richard's anger, named to the same office Philip of Poictiers, the chaptel
the king's favourite chaplain and clerk, who became afterwards
bishop of Durham.

Both parties now appealed to Rome, and both took the precaution Appeals on
of laying the circumstances before the king in Germany. Simon Ofetheb3e
visited Richard in person, and so got the first word. The king at deanery
first contented himself with forbidding the appeals and summoning
Geoffrey into his presence ; but finding that Geoffrey did not obey the Richard
summons, he allowed the canons free action against him.1

The archbishop's delay or disobedience was thus accounted for. Geoffrey

fails to obey

He had started on the receipt of the king's order and had reached the the king's
coast, when the received the intelligence of the closing of the minster
and the other outrageous doings of the chapter.2 He immediately He visits
sent to York by his clerks a peremptory command to the clergy of the piaces^s
cathedral to return to their duties ; this they treated with contempt, °,TSielerks
and the archbishop found that he must return in person. He did so, ^j^ in
arrived at York on the first of January 1194, and found the church 1194
deserted.3 Taking counsel, as Hoveden tells us, with prudent men,
he substituted for the contumacious clerks another body of chaplains,
and excommunicated the canons. The latter, determined to lose no
time, sent four of their number to the king. These four were Hamo Hamo aud
the precentor, who henceforth throws his influence into the scale take part
against Geoffrey ; Geoffrey Muschamp, archdeacon of Cleveland, for a
whom the archbishop had in earlier years obtained his prebend ;
William Testard, archdeacon of Nottingham, who, like Hamo, had
in 1190 acted as his agent in Rome ; and the archdeacon of the
West Riding.4 They reached Richard before he heard from his
brother, took advantage of his momentary irritation, and obtained
leave to carry their appeal to Rome. Simon of Apulia was allowed simon goes
at the same time to prosecute his claim to the deanery, and the whole **
party proceeded to lay their complaints before Celestine III. A few

1 Hoveden, iii. 229, 230. ordered back by the archdeacon of

2 Hoveden, iii. 223. Gervase says Canterbury, and returned to York, c.
that he had got a good way towards 1586. That was perhaps the Canter-
the sea, going by cross-country roads bury view of the story.

in order to carry his cross erect hi 3 Hoveden, iii. 229, 230.

the province of Canterbury ; but was 4 Hoveden, iii. 272.

278 THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

days after, Richard's liberation was arranged, and in March he
returned to England.

With Richard's return began new complications for Geoffrey.
Nottingham, the first place to which Richard directed his way after
landing, was in Geoffrey's diocese. There Geoffrey met his brother
and was not unkindly received. He had the good sense even to
this occa- avoid giving new offence to Hubert Walter ; and, by not carrying
his cross erect, showed that he had placed himself under strong
restraint.1 Unfortunately this was not met with like moderation on
Hubert's part. He insisted on having his cross carried erect, and,
when Geoffrey remonstrated, somewhat insolently threw doubts on
his right to be regarded as archbishop, winding up with an appeal to
Rome against him. Geoffrey complained to the king, who declined
to arbitrate, and recommended him not to appear with his cross at the
approaching coronation for fear of a quarrel.2 This caused Geoffrey
to absent himself from the coronation, but, anxious to maintain his
right, he presented himself to the king at Waltham, near Portsmouth,
with cross erect. It was now Hubert's turn to remonstrate, but
Richard refused to settle the dispute ; it was, he said, the pope's
duty, not his. Hubert nursed his anger till the king was gone.
He buys the Notwithstanding this rising cloud, the archbishop and the king
of Yorkshire were on the best terms during Richard's visit. Geoffrey sat on the
king's left hand in the great council of Nottingham,3 was allowed to
purchase the sheriffdom of Yorkshire for 8,000 marks,4 and to treat
with contempt the complaints made against him by clerks and lay-
men of his diocese for pecuniary exactions, the secret of which was
well enough known to the king.6 He attended the king also at Win-
chester and Portsmouth ; although he absented himself from the coro-
Richard re- nation, it was partly at the king's request.6 Richard showed his sense
French of this behaviour by restoring to him his estates in Anjou and Touraine,
and by compelling Longchamp to apologise for, or disavow in legal
form, the ill-treatment that Geoffrey had been subjected to at Dover
in 1191.7

Hi« enemies But although Richard may have been sincere in his desire of
only tor a peace and goodwill to the unfortunate Geoffrey, every glimpse of
good luck only served to enhance the disappointment which uniformly
followed. Hoveden himself exclaims against his folly in undertaking
the sheriffdom, and throwing himself into the power of the king in a
lay office. The complaints, which at Nottingham and in his brother's
presence he was strong enough to ignore, were only silenced for a

1 Hoveden, iii. 239. * Hoveden, iii. 242.

1 Hoveden, iii. 246, 247, 250. • Hoveden, iii. 246, 247.

1 Hoveden, iii. 240. ' Hoveden, iii. 2.10, 251.
4 Hoveden, iii. 241.

THE CHEONICLE OF KOGEB OF HOVEDEN

279

time. The ear of the justiciar was quick, where the king had been
willingly deaf. The news from Rome also was untoward, and the
dean and canons were on their way home.

The archbishop of Canterbury waited some months before he
took the first step in accomplishing the ruin of the rival primate. In
August or September, however, when Richard had got as far as
Guienne, Hubert, in his character of justiciar, sent to York a com-
mission of the royal judges, Earl Roger Bigot, William of Warenne,
William Stuteville, Hugh Bardolf, William Briwere, Geoffrey Haget,
and William FitzRichard, to hear the complaints of the canons.
These barons carried matters with a high hand. The archbishop's
servants who were accused of robbery they took and imprisoned ;
they then summoned Geoffrey himself to appear before them.1 He
refused, took refuge in his manor at Ripon, and was declared
contumacious. The whole estates of the see, with the exception of
Ripon, were then taken possession of by the king's officers ; the
canons were replaced in their stalls ; and although the justiciar did
not venture to assume the sheriffdom or to remove Geoffrey's sub-
sheriff, Roger of Batvent, he placed over them both, as custodes,
William Stuteville and Geoffrey Haget.2 This was one of the most
arbitrary and high-handed proceedings of Hubert's ministry ; and
hardly anything, either on moral, legal, or constitutional grounds,
can be said in excuse for it. The restoration of the canons by force
to the places which they had deserted, and to which they had refused
to return at the orders of the archbishop, was extremely irregular ;
and the whole transaction is a serious blot on Hubert's fame.

Scarcely had Geoffrey realised the blow that personal enmity
had directed, when the appellants arrived in triumph from Rome.
The same month, before Michaelmas, Hamo and the archdeacons of
Cleveland and Nottingham presented themselves with papal letters.3
They had had indeed signal success. Simon of Apulia had been
confirmed in the deanery by the pope, the sentences of excommunica-
tion issued against the canons had been annulled, and a mandate
issued for the restoration of their ecclesiastical rights and properties,
which had been already effected by the authority of the justiciar.
But this was not all : Celestine III. by letters dated May 31 had
commissioned the dean of Lincoln and the archdeacons of Leicester
and Northampton to compel the archbishop not merely to restore
the property, but to give satisfaction for the loss involved in the

justices at

They take

the cauons

of tie*"1'
mmistera

Return of
iantsPfrom
temper 1194

TWO com-
the arch-

1 Hoveden, iii. 261, 262.

2 Koger de Batvent acts as under-
sheriff to Geoffrey to the end of
Richard's reign, as may be ascertained
from the Pipe Rolls ; at the same time

it seems very probable that Geoffrey
never paid the 3,000 marks which he
had bid for the office. This sum was
still due in 1200. Hoveden, iv. 140.
* Hoveden, iii. 272.

280

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

agaiiut him

Point* to be
examined
by the dele-
gates

Privileges
granted at
Rome to the
chapter of

York

seizure of it, and empowered them to assess the damages ; ' a week
after, he issued a second commission to the bishop of Lincoln, the
archdeacon of Northampton, and the prior of Pomfret,2 in which
he rehearsed the heavy charges laid by the clergy of the province
and confirmed by the evidence of thirteen abbots, eleven of them
Premonstratensian, against Geoffrey. In these the archbishop is
described as neglecting all the duties of his high office, as spending
his time in hunting and hawking ; he never holds ordinations or
synods or consecrates churches ; the only spiritual function he
discharges is excommunication ; he destroys the liberties of the
Church, prevents appeals to the Holy See, and frustrates by violence
the execution of its commands ; he misuses his patronage in the
most shameless way, shows a marked contempt of the religious
orders, and has robbed and maltreated his own canons. The delegates
are empowered to hear evidence and send it sealed to Rome. If
there be a lack of evidence the archbishop is to be made to find
compurgators, three bishops and three abbots : if he fail to do that,
notwithstanding the lack of evidence, he is to be deposed. If, how-
ever, he has before receiving their citation appealed to Rome, they
are to give him three months' notice, at the expiration of which he
must appear at Rome. A more outrageous sentence on an ex-parte
statement was never issued, nor is it to be supposed that Celestine,
arbitrary and violent as he was, would have condescended to such
injustice except under strong pressure. It is to be feared that the
measure was pressed by the whole force of the royal agents acting
under Hubert Walter's direction. The fact that the eleven com-
plaining abbots were Premonstratensians, members of an order
specially affected by Hubert,3 looks like a strong confirmation of this
conjecture.

But the canons had not been content with this : they had procured
a privilege which was to preserve them against all attacks, not only
of Geoffrey but of any other archbishop ; this is dated on the 16th of
June. It first confirms the dean and chapter in the possession of all
their estates, customs, and liberties in the ordinary form of charters,
but then goes on to direct that the archbishop shall not have the
power to issue sentence against any member of the chapter without
the consent of the whole body, nor to relax sentences issued by them

' Hoveden, iii. 285, 286.

* Hoveden, iii. 279-281.

* Hubert's abbey, founded at West
Dereham, was Premonstratensian, and
in his final concord with the monks of
Canterbury he proposed to erect a
similar house at Lambeth. Banulf
Glanvill, his uncle, founded another,

Leystone, in Suffolk ; Glanvill's son-
in-law, William of Auberville, founded
Langdon, in Kent ; Helewisia, daughter
of Glanvill, founded Coverhain Abbey
in Yorkshire. A large proportion of
the Premonstratensian houses in
England were thus founded by Hubert'*
kinsfolk.

THE CHKONICLE OF KOGEE OF HOVEDEN 281

against their enemies ; that the dean shall not do homage to the
archbishop ; that the archbishop's nominees to the vacant stalls shall
be made to take an oath to the dean and chapter, and be installed by
the precentor under the mandate of that body, and that if the
archbishop shall fail to fill up the vacancies within the time prescribed
by the Lateran Council, the chapter shall do it in his place by apostolic
authority and without appeal.1 The last of these powers they intended
to use with unscrupulous pertinacity against the archbishop.

We are not to suppose that all these letters were produced at once, Restoration
although probably the archbishop's agents would be able to guard him canons, sept,
against a surprise. The mandate for the restoration of the canons
was, however, published on Michaelmas day by Hugh de Puiset,2 and
the report of the further measures in contemplation had the effect
of hurrying Geoffrey to Normandy. He first appealed against the ^"^
papal sentence and then betook himself to the king, who for a pay- Normandy
ment of 2,000 marks ordered him to be reinstated in all his rights chases
and properties, and to be no longer molested by lay power in the goodwiiHn
exercise of his spiritual functions. This decision of Richard, dated Novem
at Mamers on the 3rd of November,3 had the affect of annulling the
proceedings taken by the justiciar in September. At the same time
the king, at Geoffrey's instigation, directed that the estates of three of
the canons, Geoffrey archdeacon of Cleveland, William of Stigandby,
and Master Erard, should be seized, as their title to the preferment
was insufficient. These were the men whose collations had been
sealed by Geoffrey as chancellor after his father's death ; they had
turned against him the power which his carelessness or chicanery
had placed in their hands.4 Having gained these advantages Geoffrey Geoffrey
determined to continue by his brother's side at least until the first court
violence of the papal procedure should have broken, or more favourable
terms could be obtained from Eome. He appointed as his officials He appoints
at York Master Honorius and Gerard de Bowell,5 on whom devolved MS official
the burden of defending his interests in his absence. He himself did
not return to England until after Eichard's death.

The year 1195 opened with a tardy attempt on the part of the Proceedings
judges delegate to examine into the charges against the archbishop, gates^t66
The bishop of Lincoln and his colleagues had given Geoffrey ample Ja°n£iry
time to appeal. On the 15th of January they formally began 1195
proceedings at York, heard evidence on both sides, and in accordance
with their instructions directed both parties to present themselves at
Rome on the 1st of June.6 About the same time, apparently, the

1 It is printed in Wilkins, Concilia, 4 Hoveden, iii. 274.

i. 503. * Hoveden, iii. 298.

* Hoveden, iii. 272, 273. « Hoveden, iii. 230, 231, 278-282.
3 Hoveden, iii. 274.

282

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

Proceeding*
o( tin- other
commission :

thedanMfM

ArriTml of
the new
dean

Simon of
Apnlla
force* his
way to tl.>-

Death of
Hnghde
Puiset,
March 1185

Quarrel
about the
consecration
of the
rbrigni

other commission which was directed to assess the damages of the
canons held two sittings, one at Torksey, the other at Ancaster, and
having heard the claims of the injured parties adjudged the arch-
bishop to pay them a thousand marks.1

A month after the opening of the commission, the new dean,
Simon of Apulia, made his appearance at York ; before he reached
the gates he was met by a large party of citizens and clergy ; he
produced letters of confirmation from both the pope and the king,
and insisted on being received as dean. Two of the archbishop's
adherents, Master John Otui and William de Bonneville, protested
against this being done until the whole controversy was settled, and
in their intemperate zeal laid hands on Simon. He, in the usual
way, replied by excommunication. The citizens thereupon gave way
and deserted the assailants. He made his way to the minster and
was received by the canons in procession on the 12th of February,
and on the 15th the bishop of Durham visited the church and con-
firmed the sentence issued by him against the archbishop's friends.
This was Hugh de Puiset's last public act ; he was taken ill, on his
way from York to London, at Doncaster, and died at Howden on the
3rd of March.2

Although Hugh de Puiset had not taken an overt part against
Geoffrey since Richard's return, he had generally been found ready
to help the other side. His death, no doubt, delivered the archbishop
from a dangerous rival. It would, however, have been absurd in
Hugh to have joined in the accusations made against Geoffrey at
Rome, as nearly all of them might have been brought with much
greater plausibility against himself.

The absence of Geoffrey and the death of Hugh de Puiset left
the north of England without a resident bishop. The approach of
Easter made it an important question to what source the clergy
should look for the supply of chrism, the consecration of which
ought to take place on Maundy Thursday. Geoffrey's suffragan,
Bishop John of Whithern, came to York a few days before, and
offered to perform the ceremony, but the dean and chapter refused
his services ; he went on to Southwell and did it there, the arch-
bishop's officials undertaking the distribution of it. It is a sign of

1 Hoveden.iii. 286. William Testard,
in 1197, paid 300 marks into the Ex-
chequer, ' pro habendo archidiaconatu
suo, secundum quod ei adjudicatus
fuit a judicihus delegatis." Madox,
Hist. Exch. 336. Simon of Apulia, in
1195, paid 6662. 13s. 4d., ' de dono BUO '
(Rot. Pip. 7 Rich. I.), and in the
eighth year, 1196, Master Erard, the

archdeacon of Cleveland, and William
of Stigandby owed 100Z. for recover-
ing the king's favour. In this case
Simon's payment at least must have
been equivalent to a purchase of his
preferments, but it was perhaps dic-
tated by a sense of prospective
favours.

z Hoveden, iii. 283-286.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGEE OF HOVEDEN 283

the prevalent spirit that the archdeacon of Cleveland on the receipt contempt
of the sacred substance threw it on a dunghill. The York clergy chrism
applied to Hugh of Lincoln for a supply, but here Archdeacon Peter,
the archbishop's brother, interposed and forbade the bishop to grant
their request, appealing to Eome on his behalf.1

. Hubert Walter had now an opportunity of showing his contempt Hubert
for Geoffrey. The pope had made him on the 18th of March legate legate
of all England. His first measure under his new powers was to
come and hold a visitation at York. He came as iusticiar as well as Revisits

York a**

legate, on the llth of June ; on the 12th his officers held assizes ; legate and
on the 13th he visited St. Mary's and deposed the abbot ; and on the junfim
two following days held a council at which the leading members of
the chapter, Simon, Hamo, and the archdeacons of Cleveland and
Nottingham attended.2 The canons passed at his council are
important, but they cannot be shown to have any special bearing on
the state of the Church in the province, or on the quarrels with
Geoffrey. Although the act of visitation was one of ostentatious ?esults UE-

0 important

contempt, it could hardly have done any harm to the latter ; the
legate was morally restrained from any substantial injustice ; and
the only question touching Geoffrey's interests which arose on the
occasion was left undecided. The archdeaconry of the West Riding,
vacant by death, had been given by Geoffrey first to his brother
Peter, who wisely kept out of the hornet's nest, and then to Peter of
Dinan, chancellor of Brittany. Peter of Dinan on this occasion Hubert
demanded installation ; the dean and chapter insisted that the VOMUR
appointment under Pope Celestine's recent charter had lapsed to theiocai
them ; Geoffrey's officials appealed, and Hubert, not seeing his way qual
to a decision, allowed their appeal to stand.3 Hubert paid a second
visit to York at Christmas, but nothing seems to have been done
affecting the main question. On one of these two occasions the
archbishop's officials refused to receive him as legate, and were in
consequence removed by him ; but on consideration he restored
them, and they retained their authority until the arrival of the
sentence from Rome.4

In the meantime Geoffrey, in attendance on his brother, was Proceedings
letting matters go against him by default at both York and Rome.
The 1st of June came, and he did not present himself to the pope.

1 Hoveden, iii. 286, 287. privilege acquired by the church of

2 Hoveden, iii. 292-298. W. Newb. York a few years before, exempting the
lib. v. cap. 12. The latter writer archbishop and the church from lega-
accounts for the conduct of the canons tine visitation. This must have been
in attending this visitation thus : the privilege overruled by Celestine III.
'legato potius, quern amicum et patro- in his commission to Hubert. Hove-
num optabat, maluit subjici, quam den, iii. 291.

illius [sc. Gaufridi] non fraenandam 3 Hoveden, iii. 297, 298.

potentiam experiri.' He mentions a 4 Hoveden, iii. 316, 317.

UM-I

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

Thearcli-
bUbopU

- is;n i. i. :.

1195

S. Hugh of
Lincoln re-
fuge* to
deprive
Geoffrey

(leoffrey
offend* the

He goes to
Borne early
In 1196

The pope
issues
letters in
hU favour

Richard
opposes the
restoration
of the arch-
bishop

Geoffrey

k.'0-T fcflhl

tO KOIJIP

Celestine, unwilling to be harsh with him, prolonged the day of
grace until the 18th of November. No appearance was entered then,
and, a month after, definite sentence was issued ; Geoffrey, as
contumacious, was suspended from his spiritual functions, and the
administration of the diocese was committed to the dean. Three
sets of letters were despatched on the 28rd of December, to the dean,
to the clergy, and to the judges delegate ; the last enjoining the
continuation of the inquiry and the furthering of additional evidence
to Rome.1

This last injunction was probably the result of an application of
the canons who were offended at the remissness of the judges
delegate ; they had applied for a decree of suspension against
Geoffrey, which S. Hugh had refused, declaring that he would
rather be suspended himself than suspend the archbishop.2 Richard
was now growing tired of his brother's company. More than once
they had had to renew their reconciliation ; but Geofrey, as imprudent
as ever, bethought himself at last of rebuking Richard for his sins.
This was more than the king at the moment would stand. He went
into a violent passion, and directing that he should be disseised both
of his archiepiscopal estates and of the sherifFdom.3

The papal mandates reached York early in 1196 ; the archbishop's
officials were removed, the dean undertook the spiritual jurisdiction,
and for the time had reached the summit of his ambition. Geoffrey,
on hearing the news, made his way at last to Rome, where he appears
to have arrived in the spring. With some difficulty he obtained a
hearing from Celestine, who was justly provoked at his contumacy ;
that hearing, however, served materially to alter the complexion of
affairs. The accusers admitted that they were unable to prove the
charges, and a complete acquittal followed. New letters were issued
declaring the innocence of Geoffrey, and ' insinuating ' that the accu-
sations were false and fictitious.4

Richard's indignation at this news seems to prove that his
previous show of reconciliation, however often repeated, was insincere,
and that his sole purpose throughout the struggle was to wring money
from Geoffrey ; whilst they were friends he extorted it in one way,
when they quarrelled he confiscated the estates of the see. He now
saw that the papal acquittal would make Geoffrey practically inde-
pendent of him ; he immediately directed that the sentence should
be ignored, and took upon himself the bestowal of the vacant prefer-
ments. Geoffrey, hearing this, returned from France, which he had
already reached on his way home, and retired to Rome.5 We lose

1 Hoveden, iii. 231, 281, 809-319.
1 Hoveden, iii. 305, 306.
• Hoveden, iii. 287.

4 Hoveden, iv. 7.
• Hoveden, iv. 8.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN 285

sight of him for some time : he probably remained, if not at Rome,

out of Richard's reach for more than a year. During this time very Humours of

untoward reports were brought to England. Ralph of Wigetoft, forged an

Geoffrey's agent at Rome, being on his deathbed, confessed to the pope h

that he had sent forged letters to England. Celestine warned Hubert

Walter of this, and by his commands Roger of Ripon, the bearer of

Ralph's letters, was arrested, and a quantity of poison found upon

him. This he declared his master had given him to poison Dean

Simon, who accordingly was summoned to London ; the poison, in

the shape of gold rings and a belt, was presented to him, and, with

the letters, burnt at Tothill fields. The bearer of them was imprisoned.

The story, of which the details are very suspicious, was made a ground

for new charges against Geoffrey.1

The peremptory action of Richard decided the struggle for the New ap-
York preferments against the archbishop, whose absence in 1196 lost tottuTYork
him some very fine windfalls. Bouchard de Puiset died, and poor digmtie
Hamo was again disappointed of the treasurership ; the king gave it to
Master Eustace, the keeper of his seal ; William de Chimeli was
made a bishop, and the archdeaconry of Richmond was likewise
bestowed on Eustace. Peter de Ros, archdeacon of Carlisle, died and
his stall was given to Aimeri Thebert, nephew of the new bishop of
Durham, who had succeeded Bouchard in his Durham preferment.2
In all these cases Geoffrey's claims were passed over, and the chapter
did not venture to assert their right against the king. Richard further
nominated Adam of Thornovere, Geoffrey's old servant and recent
opponent, to the archdeaconry of the West Riding ; but Peter of Dinan,
whom the archbishop himself had appointed, managed also to obtain
a nomination from the king. The two claimants thereupon agreed
to divide the revenues of the office, and to occupy the archdeacon's
stall, when they both happened to be in York, on alternate days.3

Matters languished on until the spring of 1198, and Richard Richard's
then set himself in earnest to remedy the disgraceful state of anarchy il^to re-"
which had so long prevailed. Early in the year he summoned Geoffrey archbishop
to court, to meet the dean and canons. Geoffrey arrived first, found "anonsf
Richard placable, and made his peace with him once more, Richard
on this occasion promising that he would not again interfere with
the bestowal of his patronage. He also granted him full restitution,
and sent one of his clerks with Honorius, Geoffrey's official, to
England to enforce it. Geoffrey was not to return immediately to
England, but to go to Rome on the king's business ; he set off for
Rome ; two days after his departure the dean and canons arrived at Defeated i>y
court, and so worked on the king that he delayed the restitution of r

1 Hoveden, iv. 15, 16. 2 Hoveden, iv. 12, 14. * Hoveden, iv. 8, '.).

286

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

New at-
tempt on the
king s part.

He proposes
an arbitra-
tion.

The negotia-
tions again
broken off
by the
chapter.

Geoffrey
bestows the
archdea-
conry of
Richmond
on Honor i us

Opposition
of the dean.

One canon
only takes
Geoffrey's

-. 1- .

the archbishopric until Geoffrey's return ; and this done, not being
anxious to face the archbishop, they hastened back in triumph to
York.1

Several events were now making it extremely necessary that a
decision should be come to. Celestine III. was dead, and Innocent III.
was likely to look upon matters with much clearer eyes than his
predecessor. Hubert Walter's influence with Richard was becoming
smaller, and within a few months he had to resign the justiciarship.
The promotion of Eustace the chancellor, and Geoffrey Muschamp,
opened again the question of the preferments.2 The news of the
pope's death seems to have stopped Geoffrey on his way to Rome ;
he returned to the king at Andely, and Simon and the canons were
recalled to meet him.3 Richard proposed an arbitration : the arch-
bishop of Rouen and the bishops of Winchester and Worcester would
act as umpires. Geoffrey consented ; the dean and canons refused ;
they demanded a tribunal consisting of secular canons only, and
insisted that before the general question was discussed the archbishop
should confirm them all in the preferments which the king had given
them. Their arguments weighed with Richard more than can be
accounted for, if he were moved by argument alone. He broke off
the negotiation and sent back the canons more jubilant than ever.4

The treasurership and archdeaconries of Richmond and Cleveland
were now vacant. The first of these was at last handed over to
Hamo, and the precentorship vacated by his promotion was given to
Reginald Arundel. The archdeaconry of Richmond Geoffrey bestowed
on his official Honorius, exacting from him, however, the concession
of the right of institution to benefices, a peculiar right of the arch-
deaconry given in the time of Henry I. as compensation for the loss
of the jurisdiction in the new diocese of Carlisle.5 Honorius had
been until now a faithful servant of Geoffrey ; on his promotion he,
like Simon of Apulia and with a somewhat similar excuse, turned
against him and involved him in another long litigation. He now
hastened into Yorkshire, received the submission of the clergy, and
presented his letters of appointment at York.6 But Simon was ready
for him. The letters were informal, they did not mention the dean ;
moreover, the king had nominated Roger of S. Edmund, and by
virtue of the privilege of Pope Celestine Roger was installed ;
Honorius appealed, but was sent about his business. Hoveden adds
that but one of the canons, Hugh Murdac, who on a previous occasion
had taken part against Geoffrey, now refused to join in the conspiracy

1 Hoveden, iv. 44, 45.
* Hoveden, iv. 41, 45.
1 Hoveden, iv. 51, 52.

4 Hoveden, iv. 53.

4 Hoveden, iv. 177 180.

' Hoveden, iv. 52.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN 287

against him, and was excommunicated by the dean.1 He had appealed He is ex-
before the sentence, but the violent and unscrupulous Italian showed cated"'"
no regard to this, and on Hugh's presenting himself in the choir he
ordered the candles to be extinguished and stopped the service.

On the failure of the negotiations at Andely, Geoffrey proceeded Return of
to Eome and laid his case before the new pope. Innocent III. saw Rome Fin-
through the duplicity of the king, the unscrupulous craft of Simon, wltes'iifhis
and the wrong-headedness of Geoffrey ; he wrote to Eichard begging favour
him to be reconciled with his brother, and holding out an indistinct
threat of interdict if he should not. Richard thereupon made a last Failure of a
attempt at compromise ; he sent the bishops of Durham, Ely, at com^1"1*
Winchester, Worcester, and Bath to propose peace ; Geoffrey Promise
was to confirm the king's gifts ; the king would then restore him to
his see.2 Geoffrey demurred ; would the mediating bishops put
their advice on record that it might go sealed to the pope ? They
refused, and the treaty was again broken off. Geoffrey returned to Letters of
Rome and obtained a decision in his favour on all points. The r<
king's agents reported to him that this was to be enforced by interdict.
Before, however, the letters were issued, April 28, 1199, Richard Death of the
was dead. Geoffrey had advanced eight days' journey from Rome k" s
when he heard of it ; he returned, to make assurance doubly sure, to
the holy city.3

Much of the interest of the contest now terminates. John, at all Relations of
events at this period of his life, did not dislike Geoffrey so much as Geoffrey1
Richard had done. The difference in their age, probably, precluded
the feeling of personal rivalry, which had embittered the relations of
Richard with a brother whose early exploits and military accomplish-
ments were little inferior to his own. In the great struggle of 1191 improve
John had taken the part of Geoffrey, and before the papal sentence Geoffrey's
in his favour reached England the change of sovereign had had prospect
the effect of improving the archbishop's prospects. Honorius was
immediately received as archdeacon of Richmond ; 4 Simon there-
upon excommunicated him, and John was obliged peremptorily to
direct the status quo to be observed until he should be able to decide.
His decision, promulgated a few weeks after his coronation, was in
Geoffrey's favour. Whilst still in England he ordered that the arch- Restoration
bishop's manors should be restored as soon as he returned. The °
brothers met at Rouen on the 24th of June ; several of the canons
placed their presentations in the hands of Geoffrey as having been
illegally acquired, and he proceeded to readjust them as equitably as
he could. Adam of Thornovere, the dean Simon, the new precentor,
and others still held out.5

1 Hoveden, iv. 53. 2 Hoveden, iv. 66, 67. 3 Hoveden, iv. G7, 92.

* Hoveden, iv. 89. s Hoveden, iv. 93.

•2HS

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

Me tuition
of Fetor of
Capua

Formal
peace con-
cluded in
1800

Quarrel of
Geoffrey
with John

Moderation
of John on
this occa-
sion

Geoffrey
purchases
his favour

Cardinal Peter of Capua had been sent by Innocent to arrange, if
possible, the many causes of discontent and trouble now operating
in both England and France, and so pave the way to a new crusade.
Under his influence the two parties agreed to accept as arbitrators
the bishop of Lincoln and Master Columb, the pope's subdeacon ;
but the influence of Hubert Walter and Geoffrey FitzPeter was used
to prevent the completion of any arangement, and mutual recrimina-
tions at first seemed the only result.1

At last, towards the end of the year 1200, a formal peace was
concluded at Westminster. Bishop Herbert of Salisbury and Abbot
Alan of Tewkesbury, the last judges delegate appointed by the
pope, were accepted as arbitrators ; after long discussion Geoffrey
received to the kiss of peace, first his old ungrateful servant William
Testard, then Reginald Arundel the precentor, and at last Dean
Simon himself. Personal enmity being at an end, all further questions
were to be settled in the chapter-house at York.2

The great ecclesiastical dispute ends here. The peace settled no
principle, for no principle was involved in the quarrel. It would be
well if we could assert that Geoffrey had learned wisdom and
moderation by it. But this was not the case. A month was
scarcely over when he rushed into a quarrel with John. The king
had summoned him to go to France ; he had neglected to obey ; he
had refused to let his tenants pay the carucage ; John was provoked ;
Geoffrey was again dispossessed by the sheriff of Yorkshire, his own
tenure of the sheriffdom having at last expired ; and he retaliated
by excommunicating, not only the sheriff and all his abettors, but all
those who had irritated the king against him. At the same time
he excommunicated the townsmen of Beverley for breaking into his
park.3

John, acting under good advice, tried to avoid another struggle.
The archbishop, in resisting the royal exactions, would have a strong
party on his side, the same party, in fact, that he had formerly
alienated by the exactions he had made in the interest of Richard ;
the king ordered his estates to be restored on the understanding that
he should give an account of himself before the Curia Regis, and
pay a sum of three thousand marks which he owed king Richard.4
Some insults offered by his servants to John, on his visit to
Beverley in January 1201, embittered matters still further, but at
Mid-Lent he received his brother at York and made peace again with
a pecuniary fine ; and in May John issued a full charter of restitu-
tion in return for a promise of a thousand pounds sterling, for the
payment of which the archbishop pledged his barony to the king.5

1 Hoveden, iv. 99. * Hoveden, iv. 126. » Hoveden, iv. 139, 140.

4 Hoveden, iv. 140. » Hoveden, iv. 157, 103.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN 289

At this point Hoveden's chronicle ends ; but we leave Geoffrey, New
although reconciled with John, again engaged in a struggle with the the
chapter. The suit of Honorius was still being prosecuted.1
Reginald of Arundel the precentor was dead ; Geoffrey nominated a Constant
new one ; the dean objected. Geoffrey appointed his official, Ralph the ton °£
of Kyme, to the archdeaconry of Cleveland, which he had unwisely blshopCh~
left unclaimed since 1198 ; the dean declared that it had lapsed, and
that the chapter had presented Hugh Murdac. Geoffrey insisted on
installing Ralph ; Simon insisted that only the precentor could law-
fully install, and now there was no precentor. So Geoffrey
excommunicated Hugh Murdac, whom two years before the dean
had excommunicated as his partisan.2 Next the provost of Beverley
died. Geoffrey appointed his brother Morgan ; Simon appealed
against this on the ground that the archbishop had promised the
reversion of the provostship to himself, the bitterest, most ungrate-
ful, most unscrupulous of his foes ! 3

Such was the atmosphere in which the last days of Roger Atmosphere
Hoveden were spent ; an atmosphere so redolent of curses that one aeu's last
cannot wonder at his belief that the devil was just then unloosed. d
Reflexions on the story are needless.

Archbishop Geoffrey lived for more than ten years after our couciusioi^
chronicle closes. His struggles with the dean and canons continue, adventures8
but they are lost sight of in the more important contests into which
he was forced by John's unconstitutional demands for money. He
never again was brought so low as he had been under Richard, but
in 1207 he was compelled to choose between unconditional sub-
mission to John and exile. He chose the latter ; left England,
rather than pay the sums demanded by the king, and never
returned. He died in 1212, and was buried in the church of the
order of Grandmont, Notre Dame du Pare, in the neighbourhood of
Rouen.4 His character has been variously read ; all things con- character of
sidered he seems to have resembled Richard in his nobler traits and Geoffrey °p

1 Hoveden, iv. 177-184. ' Cur fundum fundo cumulas, quad-
Hoveden, iv. 158. rasque rotundum ?

3 Hoveden, iv. 174. ' Stercus in immundum tandem

4 Dr. Ducarel saw his monument restat tibi fundum.

with this epitaph : — ' Sed vivas mundo ut sis salvus a

' Regis erat natus, meritis et honore morte secundo.'

probatus, Ducarel, Anglo-Norman Antiquities,

' Vermibus esca datus, his qui jacet p. 38. It is interesting to observe

incineratus. that he was buried in a church of the

' Hie quid opes sequeris, quid, homo, Good Men of Grandmont, as his father

fugientia quaeris ? had wished to be. The day of his

'Hoc speculo quid eris, finemque death was Dec. 18. Stapleton, Nor-

tuum mediteris. man Rolls, ii. clxx.

U

290

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

f'onBtitn-
tional im-
portance cf
Hubert
Walter's
ministry

Importance
of the
transitional
period pre-
ceding
Magna
Carlo

Hubert's
relations
with
Richard
and John

01 ir itn
of Hubert's
policy

in his least repulsive faults ; to have been generous, impulsive, and
open-hearted ; his sufferings were the result, firstly, of his unhappy
position, laying him open to insult and extortion, and increasing his
natural irritability ; secondly, of that thoughtless, violent, impractic-
able temperament, which made him the victim of unscrupulous
opponents, and which seemed to justify the oppressiveness of his
brothers and the ingratitude of his servants. Like Ishmael, his
hand was against every man, and every man's hand against him.
Otherwise he left behind him the reputation of personal temperance
and a pure life.

II. The special importance of the ministerial career of Archbishop
Hubert Walter arises from the facts, first, that being the nephew,
pupil, and confidential friend of Ranulf Glanvill, the prime minister
of Henry II., and having occupied a position involving constant and
close intercourse with that king during the latter years of his life,
he must be regarded as the most likely person to have had a thorough
acquaintance with the principles that guided the reforms of Henry's
reign, and as probably developing those principles in the changes or
improvements which he adopted when he was himself practically
supreme ; and, secondly, that the period during which he either
exercised the authority of the crown as justiciar, or in his offices of
chancellor, archbishop, and legate brought his powerful influence to
bear on the sovereign as well as the people, was the last period of
orderly government that preceded the granting of Magna Carta. On
Hubert's death the regular administration of the country was thrown
out of gear by th6 tyrannical conduct of John, who had felt himself
under the influence of his minister, as long as he lived, to a degree
which mere gratitude and the sense of his usefulness can only insuf-
ficiently explain. Hubert's advice had been with Richard all-power-
ful ; with John it had a certain weight, sufficient to modify if not
to overrule his self-willed behaviour ; he exercised a control, the
removal of which was felt by the king as a great relief, whilst the
nation, with whom, as his master's servant, he had never been
popular, found almost immediately that in him they had lost their
best friend, the only bulwark strong enough to resist or to break the
attack of royal despotism.

In tracing, through the measures of Hubert and the men of his
school, certain steps of growth and development which connect the
legal reforms of Henry II. with the improved sense of public law and
national right that find their expression in the Great Charter, I am
not so rash as to claim for him the character of a great politician, or
even a consciously intentional programme for the education of the
people for the exercise of self-government. The utmost that could
be predicated of him in that direction would be that he was wise

THE CHRONICLE OF ROCKER OF HOVEDEN 291

enough to see that an extension of self-agency on the part of
the people, in the lines in which they were accustomed to act for
local business, was a pledge of peace and good behaviour ; that
the more they could be made to perceive that every man has a stake
in the public weal, and may take a share in the maintenance of the
public peace, the more certain would be the dependence of the com-
monwealth on the people ; the more thorough and lasting the peace,
the safer and quieter the country, the more ready and the more able
it would be to supply the wants of the crown.

The growth of our constitution was never, at least during the character

of constitii-

middle ages, sensibly affected by philosophical or doctrinaire views, tionai pro-
The several steps of growth have been almost always of a character
that might seem accidental, were it not that even in their most ex-
perimental forms they testify to an increasing confidence on the
part of the rulers in the wisdom of trusting to the people, and a
corresponding sense on the people's part of the wisdom of a just and
moderate use of their powers, as the surest way to retain and
increase them. For example, in the process by which the custom
of county representation — itself being, as the concentration of all
local machinery, the basis of English self-government — reached
its growth, no step is more certain or important than that by which
the principle of electing knights representative to choose the grand
juries and recognitors of the assizes was introduced. Yet no one
will for a moment think of asserting that that custom was intro-
duced in order to make a conscious advance towards the working out
of the principles of liberty. Neither, when we regard the custom of
assessment by jury as a step in the education of the people towards
taking the command of the national purse, do we for a moment
contemplate that education as a purpose in the mind of the ministers
who originated the plan. The result is not accidental, because it
sprang from the increase of confidence between the governors and
the governed, and proceeded by the evolution of principles the work-
ing of which we can trace in measures which suggested themselves
as the readiest for the moment and occasion ; but were it not for
this, it might seem as if the end and the means had only the most
casual connexion. And so throughout the whole story. The
English constitution owes all in it that is peculiar to itself to the
accumulation of precedents that were found to answer other ends
than those for which they were originally devised ; it is full of
anomalies and abounds in checks and counterchecks which would
be intolerable in an ideal polity ; its history is a very chapter
of accidents and experiments until it is read in the light of this
truth.

As law took the place of despotism, and organisation succeeded

292 THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

to routine ; as peace and security increased wealth, and the conscious-

ness of wealth made peace and security more precious ; as the people

educated themselves, hy the exercise of their judicial and economical

powers on a small scale, for the exercise of the same powers on a

great scale ; the advance towards a more or less perfect system of

self-government was found to be rapidly accelerating. The source of

the advance was in the deeper current to which the outward and visible

signs of it were ascribable : signs the relation of which to the main

result was on a superficial view little else than accidental. But the

actual result was shaped by those signs. In the strong conservatism

of English politics every such sign is incorporated and perpetu-

ated. The expedient of to-day is a precedent for all time ; if it fails

it is not cast aside and a new one devised, but its failure is remedied

by some new and special contrivance which in its turn is incorpo-

rated, is found to answer some other end, and is perpetuated too.

The structure, however inconvenient, is not demolished and rebuilt,

but a room is added here and a passage there ; the chapel of the old

house becomes the muniment-room of the new ; the presence-

chamber of the old palace, a mere passage to the halls and courts of

the full-grown edifice ; but every original chamber remains, and

without it the structure would not be, as it would not have become,

what it is. With the superficial student and the empiric politician

it is too common to relegate the investigation of such changes to the

domain of archaeology. I shall not attempt to rebut the imputation ;

only if such things are archaeology, then archaeology is history ; and

Oonautu- that is as much as its most fervent students would ask for it. If by

torynot archaeology is meant the science of the obsolete, I deny ! that they

are archaeological ; it is only to the plucked flower that the root is
archaeologically related. The healthy nation has a memory as well
as aspirations involved in the consciousness of its identity ; it has a
past no less living than its future. Even the energy that is based
on reform and repentance cannot afford to think of that past as the
dead burying its dead.

Hubert's Hubert Walter undertook the office of Great Justiciar at the

jTisudar'aiid beginning of the year 1194, and retained it until the middle of the
year 1198. On John's accession he became chancellor, and con-
tinued in that post until his death, exercising, however, through his
important position as legate and archbishop, an amount of authority
that no chancellor before him had enjoyed, and scarcely inferior to
what he had possessed as justiciar. It is to his career, however, as
justiciar that the following remarks chiefly apply. That portion of
his history is the one illustrated by Hoveden, and it is also the one
in which such principles of administration as he had find their freest
expression.

THE CHKONICLE OF KOGER OF HOVEDEN 293

The principal events of this administration were, in the first year summary
of it, the collecting of the large sum to be paid for Richard's ransom, "vents of
the management of the king himself during his visit to England, j^ntetra-
and the judicial iter of 1194. The year 1195 is marked by the tion
archbishop's appointment as legate, and the circumstances which
attended his first exercise of his new powers. Hoveden's pages are
filled with the troubles of Archbishop Geoffrey, and the only signifi-
cant constitutional measures are those taken for the maintenance of
the public peace. In the year 1196 come the design of remodelling
the Exchequer administration, the riot of William FitzOsbert, and
Hubert's first threat of resignation. The assize of measures is the
only important act of the year 1197. The following year is remark-
able for the successful opposition of S. Hugh of Lincoln to an
unconstitutional demand of Eichard ; for the elaborate scheme
devised for the assessment and collection of the carucage ; and for
the withdrawal of the archbishop from the office of justiciar. As all
these events are given by Hoveden in detail, and as his account of
them is not to any important extent complicated by the statements
of contemporaries, it is not necessary to reproduce it in this place.
It will be sufficient if I attempt, under the two heads of judicial and Judicial and
financial business, to point out the bearings of Hubert's policy, and business
to show the way in which his measures were tending to the end of
self-government.

Magna Carta being the translation into the language of the
thirteenth century of the ideas of the eleventh, through the forms of
the twelfth, we may naturally look for some significant transitional
data in the policy of a minister with such antecedents as those of
Hubert Walter.

The financial history comes first both in place and importance, i- Financial.
The effort that England made for the ransom of Eichard far tran- Richard's
scended anything of the kind that had taken place before. It
comprised all the ancient devices for procuring supplies, and formed
a precedent for new ones. The proceedings by which it was carried
out fall partly in the year 1193 and partly in 1194, for the aids
demanded by Eichard in person in the latter year were probably
intended to complete the sum required of him, although it cannot be
said with any certainty that they were so applied ; and it is not
quite clear, from either the language of the chroniclers or the public
records, how the disposal of the funds levied in 1193 is to be distin-
guished from that of 1194.1

1 The measures taken are described and mobilia, of the scutage, and of the

by Hoveden in more places than one. wool, and the treasure of the churches.

In vol. iii. p. 210 he mentions first the At p. 225, after recapitulating these in

demand of a fourth part of revenue different order, he adds that some of

294

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF UOVEDEN

Methods
ined for
ralslnjt tbe

Aid for

Rlcliard's

ransom

The scutage

The sum to be raised was after some negotiation fixed at 150,000
marks, 100,0007. sterling : an amount more than twice as large as
the whole revenue of the country accounted for in the last year's
exchequer of Henry II. Unprecedented as the occasion was, it does
not appear to have led the way to any national deliberation on ways
and means. Richard wrote urgently to his principal barons and
prelates, but the responsibility of the budget was undertaken by
Queen Eleanor and the justices : they demanded a scutage from the
tenants by knight service, a hidage or carucage from all tenants in
socage, a grant of a fourth part of revenue and goods from all
persons whatsoever, by way of donurn or aid ; the wool of the
Cistercians and Gilbertines, and the gold, silver, and jewels of the
churches. The ' communis assensus ' l which admitted the demand
must be attributed, not to the vote of any general assembly, but to
the feeling of common helplessness. The aid was one of the three
customary aids, and even under Magna Carta might be taken with-
out reference to the common council of the realm.

(1) In demanding a scutage of 20s. on the knight's fee the
justices did not go beyond the average rate of scutage. The rate in
the 88rd of Henry II. was the same, and the three other scutages
raised in Richard's reign were also 20s. on the knight's fee. John's
first scutage was raised to two marks. The sum thus levied must
have amounted to not less than 25,000/. if rigorously collected ; but

tbe bishops took a fourth, some a
tenth, of the revenue of the clergy.
At p. 222 he says that Archbishop
Geoffrey demanded a fourth part of
the revenue of the canons of York.
In the history of the Council of Not-
tingham in 1194 he specifies the king's
demand of the carucage, iii. 24*2.
Yet the mention of the scutage and
carucage occurs first in the Pipe Roll
of 1194. Is it possible that the im-
posts raised in 1193 were collected
by some process different from the
ordinary one of the Exchequer ? It
was certainly intrusted to special
officers (vol. iii. 212), but it is more
probable that the measures of 1194
were merely the legal carrying out of
the plan devised in 1193 than that
two scutages should be collected for
the same purpose in two successive
years, of which only one should be
mentioned in the national accounts.
William of Newburgh expatiates on the
disappointment that was felt at the
insufficiency of the sums first raised :
' Putabatur quidem tanta pecuniarum

coacervatio redemptionis regie sum-
mam excedere, quarn tamen non
attigit, cum universe part ion lac
Lundoniis convenissent ad summam ;
quod accidisse creditur per fraudem
executorum. Denique, propter hanc
primae collationis insufficientiam,
ministri regii pecundam tertiamque
instaurant, quosque locupletiores
pecuniis spoliant, manifestum rapin-
arum dedecus honesto reclemptionifi
regies nomine palliant.' After mention-
ing the collection of the treasures of
the churches, he proceeds : ' Tota tamen
ilia opum coacervatio, ut dicitur, ad
complendam regiae redemptionis atqur
expensarum ejus summam minup
sufficere potuit.' Lib. iv. cap. 38.

1 ' Statutum est communi assensu.'
R. de Diceto, 670. This writer does
not mention the scutage or carucage
under the year 1193, an additional pre-
sumption that Hoveden's statements
refer generally to the imposts raised
in the two years for the purpose. See
the last note.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN 295

it was probably assessed on the old system, and if so would not
amount to more than 12,OOOZ.1

(2) The hidage or carucage, if levied at 2s. on the hide or caru- The hiaage
cate, must have been nearly the same in amount as the ancient
Danegeld,2 and produced a sum of about 5,OOOZ. This sort of
impost had been levied during Henry II.'s reign, generally under the
name of donum, and as supplementary to the scutage.

(3) The grant of a fourth part of revenue and mobilia may be con- The grant of
trasted with the two particulars just mentioned. It no doubt took this revenue ami
form in consequence of the urgency of the occasion, and was the source n
of the largest portion of the sum achieved. Although revenue and per-
sonal property had been long liable to taxation in the shape of
talliage and donum, this appears to be the first occasion on which
they were subjected directly to central taxation. The Dialogus de
Scaccario describes the two methods of determining the incidence of
talliage : per capita,3 poll-tax, or local assessment. Here, however,
we have a direct demand of the central authority on the individual.
The principle was, nevertheless, not quite a novelty, although the
form was so. The assize of the Saladin tithe formed the precedent Precedents
for demanding a fixed portion of each man's goods, and the assize of impost, and
arms brought personal property under direct contribution for the Lc'easa
national defence. Either of these ordinances would also have afforded Preoedenfc
a precedent for an equitable method of assessment by a jury of the
venue ; but we have no authority that shows it to have been followed
on this occasion. This impost is the precedent for the grants of
subsidies in the shape of tithes, sevenths, thirteenths, fifteenths, and

1 If we compare the account given last note. For instance, the hidage of
by Madox from the Pipe Rolls of the 1194 was in Somerset 293Z. 18s. 2d. ;
sum paid as scutage in 1172 with in Dorset, 241 1. 3s. Sd. The Danegeld
those paid in 1194, we shall find them levied in 1156 was, in Somerset,
nearly identical ; e.g. in both cases 2771. 10s. 4d. ; and in Dorset, 228Z. 5s.
the archbishop of York pays 20Z. for The difference may be accounted for
his knights, William Fossard 31 1. 10s., by either the reclaiming of waste or
and so on. If the same sums were the varying number of persons ex-
paid, no doubt the same deductions cused. Madox, Hist. Exch. pp. 411,
were made, and the same compositions 412, 476, 477, &c.

held good. The scutage of 1194 would 3 Per capita may mean rather a
thus produce no more than those of household or family tax than a poll-
Henry II.'s reign. This enables us to tax; it was the arrangement by which
understand the relief given by the 44th all the payers paid equally, without
article of the Magna Carta of 1217, respect to the difference of their
' Scutagium capiatur de cetero sicut ability. To alter this and substitute
capi consuevit tempore Henrici regis an assessment by which each man
avi nostri ; ' John's scutages having would pay in proportion to his wealth
been larger in amount and arbitrarily was the pretext of the riot of William
imposed. Madox, Hist. Exch. pp. 411, FitzOsbert. Hoveden, iv. 5. See
441. Dialogus de Scaccario, lib. ii. cap. 13.

2 On the hypothesis stated in the

296

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

Demand of
wool

Demand of
the trea-
sures of
churches

Payments
in 1194

Their sup-
plementary
character

other proportions, which in the next century largely supersede the
earlier methods of taxation.

(4) The demand of the wool of the Cistercians and Gilbertines
is an important precedent also for the raising of revenue on and
through the staple article of English production.

(5) The demand of the treasures of the churches, an expedient
which, although occasionally threatened by our other sovereigns,1
was not actually repeated until the days of Henry VIIL, is a sign of
the enormous effort made by the government on this occasion, too
enormous to be taken as a safe precedent. Unfortunately, we have
no clue whatever to the actual proportions of the required sum made
up from these last three sources. The country endured the united
pressure of taxes which had never been imposed before at the same
moment, and of some that were never proposed again. England, al-
though the largest and wealthiest part, was far from being the whole
of the area to be taxed ; 2 and yet, either because the money was not
honestly applied, or because the produce fell short of the estimates,
considerable arrears of the ransom were unpaid in 1195.

In the Council of Nottingham in 1194 Richard demanded a
carucage of 2s. on the carucate ; as the mention of hidage comes into
the Pipe Rolls only in this year, we must conclude that this was the
occasion on which this portion of the revenue applied to the ransom
was granted. The language of Hoveden leads to the conclusion that
in form it was an innovation.3 On the same occasion he asked for
the wool of the Cistercians, who compounded for it with a fine.
Probably in this case also the negotiation was supplementary to
that of the year 1198. The king further demanded a third of the
military service of the country to go with him to Normandy. If
I am right in supposing that both the scutage and the carucage
were collected on the ancient assessments which had been in use in

1 This is illustrated, as well as the
demand of the wool, by the measures
taken by Edward I. when in severe
financial difficulties in 1294. He-
mingb. Chron. ii. 53, 54.

* The Norman Exchequer Roll of
1194 is lost. In that of 1195 is
an entry stating that Geoffrey the
Exchanger (Cambitor) renders ac-
count of 22.891J. 7s. 4<f. Angevin, for
5,7221. 16s. lOd. sterling; and 4.600/.
and 400J. Angevin ; altogether
27,891 1. 7s. 4d. Angevin, of which
1G.OOOZ. Angevin, answering to 6,000
murk- of silver, was paid to Ruffus de
Volto and Everard the chamberlain,
the emperor's messengers for the
delivery of the hostages. Staple-ton.

vol. i. p. 136. This may have been,
however, only the English contribution
in transitu. Further on, p. 172,
William Poignart renders account of
the receipt of 4,000 marks raised by
talliage on the town of Caen for the
king's ransom, an enormous sum.
The citizens of London in 1194 owed
l,.r)00 marks of dtmum, ' pro bene-
volentia domini regis et pro libertati-
luis suis conservandis etde auxiliosuo
ad redemptionem domini regis ' (Madox,
412), a statement which shows that
they were determined to get all they
could for their money. It is very un-
fortunate that all our information on
this important business is fragmentary.
' Hoveden, iii. '242.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN 297

Henry II. 's reign, the largest part of the burden of the ransom must
have been defrayed from the donum of the fourth part of revenue and
personal property, the most oppressive and general of the imposts ;
and we may attribute to the inquisitorial and universal pressure of
this exaction the discontent with the fiscal administration which
seems to have followed, as well as the urgent measure of reform
which the justiciar attempted later in the year.

The judicial iter of 1194 was the necessary consequence of Fiscal

i measures

Richards return and of the restoration of the governmental ma- involved m
chinery. Like the similar proceedings under Henry II., it was 1194
directed with a view to fiscal advantage ; the Inquest of Sheriffs of
1170 l was followed as a precedent ; exact inquiry was made into
the escheats, patronage, wardships, and other feudal incidents, and
into the debts and available property of John. Strict directions were
given for the re-stocking of the lands in the royal possession, and for
the supervision of the commercial and monetary dealings of the Jews.
A talliage of cities, towns, and demesne lands was also ordered.2 A taiiiage
A measure, however, of far greater importance which the justiciar
proposed, the examination into the accounts of receipts taken by the ticn'on-lie
sheriffs, bailiffs, foresters, and other servants of the Exchequer, since accoimt?
the beginning of the reign, was deferred.3 Such an examination ^"^"f1'
would no doubt have shown the very great discrepancy between the P°ued
sums collected by the local officers and those which were paid into
the treasury ; would have proved the often suspected fact that the
system of ferm or composition was ruinous to the Exchequer, which
lost the benefits of such increments as would arise from the ex-
tension of cultivated lands and improvement in agriculture ; and
would have demonstrated the necessity of a new and general system
of assessment. It was defeated, however, probably by the influence
of the fiscal officers ; although Richard was in the greatest straits
for money, and even raising funds by granting licences for tourna-
ments which had the year before been forbidden by the pope.4

The Pipe Rolls of 1195 testify to the collection of a scutagefor scntages of
the army of Normandy imposed in the seventh year of Richard, me"'
and those of 1196 to a third scutage imposed in the eighth year;
both of these were of the same amount, 20s. on the knight's fee.5

1 See Benedict, vol. iii. pref. Ixvi, to be supposed to be collections of
clv.-clviii. arrears ; they are distinctly called, the

2 This talliage, cruel enough after first, ' Secundum Scutagium exercitus
the enormous exactions of the year, is Normannife assisum anno praeteiito,'
accounted for in the Pipe Roll of 1195, i.e. 1195, Rot. Pip. 8 Rich. I. ; the
Madox, p. 486, and partly probably in second, ' Tertium Scutagium exercitus
that of 1196. Normannise assisum hoc anno,' i.e.

3 Hoveden, iii. 267. 1196, ibid. The first scutage of

4 Hoveden, iii. 268. Richard being apparently one for

5 Madox, 443, 444. These are not Wales, levied in 1189 or 1190, and

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

Rei,ew»I of
• project of
Kxchequer
reform In
1196

It U again

Discontent
of the people
and of the
king at the
state of the
finances

William
FitzOsbert's

movement

Probable
explanation
of William
FitzOsbert's
movement

Neither of these is noticed directly by Hoveden. In the latter year
the king was so much dissatisfied with his receipts from England
that he renewed the proposition for a visitation of the Exchequer,
and, greatly against the archbishop's wishes, sent over the abbot of
Caen, a clerk well versed in the method of business pursued in the
Norman Exchequer, to make inquiry into the receipts of the royal
officers.1 The carrying out of a measure which, however necessary,
would be very distasteful to the officials, was again impeded, this
time by the death of the commissioner to whom it was confided.
The abbot died at London a few days after his arrival.

We may conjecture that Richard was prompted to this proposition
chiefly by his own necessities, but he may partly have been influenced
by the condition of popular opinion, which insisted that whilst the
nation was heavily burdened the crown was poor, and that the fault
must be laid upon the ministry. This feeling found its expression
in the revolt of William FitzOsbert or Longbeard,2 which broke out
shortly after the death of the abbot of Caen. The ostensible reason
of the disturbance was the unfairness of the assessment for the taxes
payable by the citizens of London. Hoveden, who seems to have
regarded the grievance as a real one, distinctly states that it was
caused first by the frequency of the imposts, and secondly by the fact
that, owing to the craft of the richer citizens, the main part of the
burden fell on the poor. That the higher rank of citizens had the
power of doing this, either by raising the sums demanded per capita?
or by unfairly assessing the poorer people, is indeed clear. It is
probable, moreover, that the ruling body was in close connexion with
the Exchequer,4 the monetary dealings of which brought them in

accounted for in the latter year.
These three were scutages in the re-
stricted sense of commutation of
service, and the sum raised in the
same way for the ransom, although
called also a scutage, is not numbered
among them, but regarded as an aid.

1 Hoveden, iv. 5. W. Newburgh, lib.
v. cap. 19. The latter authority states
that the abbot obtained the commis-
sion by assuring the king that he was
cheated of half his revenue by the
ofiicialH of the Exchequer : ' fraude
omcialium regiorum eerario ejus pluri-
mum deperire ; qua nimirum depre-
hensa et custigata, absque omni pro-
vincialium gravamine duplicia posse
fisco accedere."

* William of Newburgh (v. 20),
although expressing an opinion con-
demnatory of William FitzOsbert, dis-
tinctly connects the two events :

' Similitndine vel cause vel proposit
consonare videbantur. Abbas enim, ut
commoda regia cum quiete provin-
cialium quaareret, fraudem atque
effrenem avaritiam omcialium regio-
rum castigandam esse censebat. Iste
autem . . . allegans . . . quod ad
omne edictum regium divites, propriis
fortunis parcentes, pauperibus per
potentitun omne onus imponerent, et
serarium principis multa summa
frnudarent.' Nearly the same words
as Hoveden uses.

1 See on this Madox, 506.

4 For instance, Henry of Cornhell,
the head of one of the two great parties
of the citizens, was manager of the
Mint in 1191, and Reginald of Corn-
hell after him, apparently during the
whole reign of Richard. Madox, 631,
632, 666.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN 299

contact ; and that the justiciar, on interfering in the dispute, took
their side too strongly. That William Longheard was an ordinary
demagogue, a deserter of the ranks with which his birth naturally
associated him, may also be true ; 1 but the fact of the grievance is
not impugned by such a consideration. The archbishop, after he
had raised enormous sums for Kichard, found that he was discon-
tented ; the people refused to believe that all the money raised reached
the royal coffers ; the system of the Exchequer and the vested interests
of the sheriffs were too strong to be broken down, and the method
of taxation was becoming obsolete. The archbishop, weary with Hubert
the odious work, teased to death by his monks, who had now appealed resign
to Eome against him on account of the pollution of Bow church,
where William Longbeard was seized, offered to resign the justiciar-
ship. After urgent remonstrance from Eichard he withdrew the
offer. Hoveden tells us that during the two preceding years he had
collected for the king not less than 1,100,000 marks of silver, a
statement which must be erroneous,2 but the belief in which shows
that the oppression by way of taxation must have been unprece-
dentedly heavy.

The Assize of Measures is the only fiscal act that marks the year Assize of
1197.3 Its chief importance lies in the fact that the wording of
Magna Carta, in the clauses that touch this question, is borrowed
from it. It was found too severe for the commercial spirit of the
country to bear, and was set aside by the justices early in the reign
of John.4

We come thus to the year 1198, a year signalised by at least two
highly important events. In the Great Council of the nation assembled

1 See the sketch of his history given to the computation of the learned
by Sir Francis Palgrave in the preface baron, the sum must be multiplied by
to the first volume of the Rotuli three to find the present value in
Curias Regis. silver, and then by twenty to ascertain

2 Hoveden, iv. 13. I think the sum its value in exchange for produce,
is incredible. At the same time it is This would make the sum annually
clear from the extracts given by Madox raised by Hubert equal to 22,000,00(K
from the Pipe Rolls that the sums of of our money, which is quite incon-
money passing backwards and forwards ceivable. If the sum had been given
at the Exchequer were much larger in figures we might suspect that a
than they had been during the pre- cipher too many was inserted, and
vious reigns. The sum of 1,100,000 that we should read 110,000 marks, or
marks is said to be computed as of 73,3332. 6s. 8d., but this would be
silver of the realm of England : no much less than would be probable,
deduction can be made from it, there- Altogether the passage defies explana-
fore, as being of foreign coin : it re- tion, except on the ground that
presents a sum of 733.333Z. 6s. 8d., or mediaeval statements of number, except
366,666Z. 13s. 4d. per annum ; a sum in strictly legal documents, cannot be
curiously approximating to Ordericus' interpreted with any approach to
statement of William the Conqueror's exactness.

daily income of 1,061Z. 10s. l^rf., on 3 Hoveden, iv. pp. 33, 34.

which see Maseres, p. 258. According 4 Hoveden, iv. 172.

300

THE CHBONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

Opposition
of Hugh of
Lincoln to
Uobert'B
demands
oo the
king's
behalf

Opposition
in the
National
Council
ton new
impost

The cam-
cage of 1198

Substitu-
tion of a
uniform for
a variable
measure-
ment

at Oxford early in the year,1 Hubert announced a demand of the
king that the barons should furnish him with a force of 800 knights,
to be paid three shillings a day each. Two of the bishops — 8. Hugh
of Lincoln, who represented at the time the religious party in England,
and the old school of liberty for which S. Anselm and Thomas Becket
had contended ; and Herbert of Salisbury,2 who represented the
older traditions of the Exchequer— opposed the grant, and the arch-
bishop was obliged in chagrin to withdraw his proposition, although
it was supported by the bishop of London, the treasurer. Whatever
were the grounds of the opposition of S. Hugh, ecclesiastical or
constitutional, this occurrence is a landmark in English constitutional
history. It may be placed on a par with S. Thomas's opposition to
Henry II. in 1168 at Woodstock, but it is the first clear case of the
refusal of a money grant demanded directly by the crown, and a most
valuable precedent for future times.

The other mark of the year is the plan devised for the collection
of a carucage.3 This impost was probably intended to redress the
balance between the tenants in knight service, who had lately paid
two scutages, and the tenants in socage, who had not been taxed for
four years ; and this may account for the fact that it was fixed at
five shillings on the carucate, more than double the rate collected in
1194. A still more important innovation was the determination that
every hundred acres should be regarded as a carucate.4 Formerly
the word was strictly interpreted to mean the land that could be
cultivated with a single plough, and of course, according to the
character of the soil, the extent varied indefinitely. The substitution
of a uniform for a variable carucate 8 was a great advantage to the

1 Magna Vita S. Hugonis, pp. 248,
249. Hoveden, iv. 40.

2 Herbert of Salisbury, called le
Poor, was the son of Bichard, arch-
deacon of Poictiers, that is, Richard of
Ilchester, the clerk of the Exchequer
to Henry II., and afterwards bishop of
Winchester. This is, I think, proved
by the documents printed in Madox's
Formulare Anglicanum, pp. 47, 52. It
is curious that he should be known by
the name of Poor, a name which cer-
tainly seems to imply some connexion
with Roger le Poor of Salisbury, and so
with Nigel of Ely, Richard FitzNeal,
and the chancellor, Roger le Poor. If
this be so, then we have the family
exercising a sort of hereditary judicial
and fiscal influence for nearly a
century and a half, Richard le Poor,
bishop of Durham, dying in 1257.

' Hoveden, iv. 46, 47.

4 According to the Dialogus de

Scaccario, i. 17, the hide was a
hundred acres : that is, it was regarded
by the time of Henry II. as of that
extent. This act of Hubert, then,
identifies the carucate henceforth with
the hide, as far as concerns extension.
In the same spirit of definition the
prices of cows, pigs, sheep, Arc., the
' animalia pacabilia,' are fixed, instead
of being allowed to vary according to
the size or condition of the animal.
See the seventh clause of the XXIIId
article of the assize of 1194. Hoveden,
iii. 265, 266.

* A parallel case to the variable
carucate is the variable oxgang which
subsisted in the last century : ' Each
field [of the common fields of Picke-
ring] consisted of 22 oxgangs, each of
which, on one side of the township,
contained 24 acres, on the other, 12.'
Marshall's Rural Economy of York-
shire, i. 51.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN 301

Exchequer, and the allowance of a hundred acres to the plough was Remeasure-

, . ment con-

not an illiberal measure towards the cnltivators. tempiated

But a consequence of greater importance resulted from the
change ; the land in cultivation must be remeasured. The old hidage
measurement of Domesday must be given up, with all its machinery
of deductions and excuses ; and for this purpose was to be employed
the plan of assessment by jury, of which the Domesday record was
the most valuable precedent, but which since Domesday 1 had been
used only for the assessment of income and personal property. To Method of

» r r r j assessing

collect this tax the king sent through each county of England a the cam-
clerk and a knight, who, with the sheriff and lawful knights chosen
for the purpose, sworn to fulfil the king's business faithfully, caused
to come before them the stewards of the barons of the county, and
from every township the lord or bailiff of the township, and the
reeve with four men of the township, whether free or villein, and
two lawful knights of the hundred, who swore that they would
faithfully and without fraud declare how many wainages of ploughs
there were in each township, how many in demesne, how many in
villenage, how many in alms ; and on the wainage of each plough
they imposed first two shillings and afterwards three. The account
was written in four rolls, kept by the clerk, the knight, the sheriff
and the stewards of the barons respectively. The money was received
by two knights and the bailiff of each hundred ; they accounted for
it to the sheriff, and the sheriff accounted for it at the Exchequer.2
The plan contains several other minute directions, but the above are Application
enough to show that the principle of representation for the purpose of represent
of assessment was fully recognised as applicable to real property, etectiou"
whilst the mention of the chosen knights, who in each county were
to superintend the proceeding, points to the speedy approach of a
time when the ideas of representation and election were to be
permanently united. The setting aside the great and venerable
assessment book of William the Conqueror for a new valuation to be
made by the representatives of the taxpayers was surely a long step
towards the exercise by the taxpayers of a direct hold on the
determination of taxation. When the elected knights who now
superintended the valuation should be called to the royal councils, and
there take part in the voting of the impost, the constitutional fabric
would come not far off its rough completion. Within less than
twenty years the principle which involved this result was to be
admitted.

Unfortunately, the records of the Exchequer do not enable us to importance
say whether this elaborate plan was carried out in its integrity ; but °

1 See the title of the Ely Domesday. Domesday, iii. 497.

2 Hoveden, iv. 46, 47.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

Importance
of the mode*
of

incut

of Hubert
Walter

Stringent
action of the
new admi-
nistration

Character of
the policy of
John

it remains a singular link between Domesday Book and Magna
Carta, and a most important precedent. An examination of the
documents contained in the Fcedera and Parliamentary Writs,1 on
the question of assessment and collection of taxes, carucages,
thirteenths, fifteenths, and the like, shows how from time to time
the main principle was varied, until, a hundred years exactly from
this date, the right of the commons to representation, and the right
of the parliament to regulate taxation, being admitted, the details of
the arrangement by which men's minds were prepared and educated
for the work sank into secondary importance.

If we suppose that the difficulties of the task thus undertaken
were greater than Hubert Walter was able to meet, we may be not
very far wrong. The day fixed for the return of the new valuation
was the 31st of May ; before the 14th of July he had resigned, and
his successor was appointed. The first act of the new administration
was to order a new iter of the judges, and this was accompanied by a
new and more stringent publication of the forest assize. The impost
of the carucage was resisted by a portion of the monastic clergy, and
a measure of practical outlawry against the whole clerical body was
needed to enforce the payment. This severe act was the first sign of
the change in the spirit of the government.3 Another was the
augmentation of the scutage and carucage at the beginning of the
reign of John,3 followed by the speedy and heavy increase of taxation
which in 1207 culminated in the demand of a thirteenth, and caused
the exile of Archbishop Geoffrey ; by the substitution, for the system
of jury assessment, of the direct valuation of the justices ; and by
the great expansion of the system of fines, which drove the barons
into rebellion. Some of these measures Hubert might have connived
at, but we can scarcely suppose that he would have taken the chief

1 1 have put together the chief docu-
ments illustrative of this process in
Select Charters (Oxford, 1870), pp
274, 342, 345, 351, 355, 357, 491. In
the first, in 1207, for the assessment
of the thirteenth, the use of jury is not
mentioned ; in the second, the carucage
of 1220, election in full county is
used ; in the third, the fifteenth of 1225,
both election and jury are employed ;
in the fourth, the fortieth of 1232, the
townships are represented by four
elected men and the reeve in each
case ; in the fifth, the scutage of 1235,
the arrangement is simply feudal, the
collection is by the stewards of the
barons ; in the sixth, the thirtieth of
1237, the knights collectors are nomi-
nated, the local assessors, the reeve

and four elected men. In the last
case, the tulliage of 1304, the collection
is made simply by the king's officers.
The comparison shows the mainten-
ance of the royal authority in cases of
strictly feudal taxation, such as scu-
tage and talliage ; and the employ-
ment of election and representation in
both the collection and assessment of
the non-feudal or national, such as
carucage and the taxes by rate of
tenth, thirteenth, &c.

• Hoveden, iv. 63.

1 The scutage was raised to two
marks on the knight's fee in 1199,
Madox, p. 444 ; and the carucage
from two to three shillings on the
carucate in 1200. Hoveden, iv. 107.
It. Coggeshale, c. 860.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN 803

part in originating them. He had probably held the supreme Hubert's
financial authority as long as he could conscientiously exercise it. He onhelus-n
resigned it by express command of Innocent III. aciarsbip

The minutiae of the judicial measures of Hubert's administration n. judicial
are not less important than those of the fiscal ; but they are simpler
and more distinctly indicative of progress. The first act to be noted
is the direction for the judicial iter of 1194, which has been several
times referred to already.1 The first clause of this document directs
the process of electing the grand jury of each county. Four knights Election of
are to be chosen from the whole county, who by their oath are to
choose two lawful knights of each hundred or wapentake, and those
two are to choose ten knights of each hundred and wapentake ; or, if
there be a lack of knights, ten lawful and free men ; so that those
twelve may together answer, on all heads, for their whole hundred
or wapentake. It is necessary for the understanding of this direction
to recur to two points in the legislation of Henry II. : the Assizes
of Clarendon and Northampton,2 and the institution of the Great
Assize.3 The two former measures constitute what may be called
by anticipation the grand jury, the inquest by twelve lawful knights
of each hundred, and four men and the reeve from each township,
into cases of reputed criminals in the hundred, with a view to the
presentment of the guilty to the itinerant justices. Such is the Extension of
character of the body instituted in 1194, but its functions are extended
to all the business of the judicial visitation. How this representative
body was under the assizes of 1166 and 1176 constituted we are not
told ; but it is most probable that the lawful knights were simply
nominated by the sheriff in the same way as the recognitors for the
assizes of mort d'ancestor and darrein presentment ; 4 it is, however, introduc-
just possible that they were elected 5 in the local assemblies, in which elective
case the reform now adopted must be referred to earlier practice. ErtoThir^
But it is in the ordinance of the Great Assize that the closer parallel °
to the direction of 1194 is to be found. According to that institution
the twelve recognitors are to be nominated by four summoned knights
of the shire in which the disputed property lies.6 In that case the
selection is removed by one step from an arbitrary selection by the
sheriff and placed in the hands of a body of four. In the direction of
1194 then, first, the practice of electing through four representatives

1 Hoveden, iii. 262. et legales homines de visineto.' They

2 Hoveden, ii. 248, for the assize of were probably nominated by the reeve
Clarendon ; ii. 89, for that of North- from a list, or at his or their conveni-
ampton. ence, as jurors for an inquest are at

3 Glanvill, De Legibus Anglise, lib. ii. the present day.

c. 7. 5 The word eligendi is used. Glan-

4 Glanvill, xiii. 3. ' Summone, per vill, xiii. 3.
bonos summonitores, duodecim liberos 6 Glanvill, ii. 7.

804

THE CHRONICLE OF ROOKK OF HOVEDEN

Rlcction or

nominal urn

How the
recognitors
of the

assizes were
appointed

Election of
knights to
take the
assizes,
prescribed
in 1216

is extended from the Great Assize to the grand jury ; secondly,
by the interposition of a second act of selection, the four knights are
to choose two who are to co-opt ten ; that is, the selection is placed
two steps instead of one only from a simple nomination. A further
point, which is of importance, is the recognition of four knights as
a sort of representative quorum of the county court for these
purposes.

The use of the word ' election ' for the process by which these four
knights were singled out leads to a further question. Are we
to understand that they were chosen in the court of the wapen-
take and county, or that they were mere nominees of the sheriff ? I
have already said that the probability is that in the selection of law-
ful men to act as recognitors in assizes of mort d 'ancestor and dar-
rein presentment, although the word eligendi is used, we are to
understand that the choice was made by the sheriff only. Those
recognitors were required only for the particular case for which they
were summoned, and there seems to be no reason to suppose that
the shiremoot or hundredmoot was called together on purpose to elect
them. The sheriff had a list of the knights, and ways of ascertain-
ing the names of the lawful men of the district, and summoned out
of them those most likely to be well informed as to the matter in
hand. And the same course was probably, if not certainly, adopted
in the selection of the four knights who nominated the recognitors
of a Great Assize. We may conclude that the great balance of
probability is in favour of the practice of simple nomination as in use
under Henry II.

If, however, we look on to Magna Carta, we shall find that the
principle of election in and by the county court was in 1215 the rule
in all cases of the sort. By the 18th clause, recognitions of novel
disseisin, mort d'ancestor, and darrein presentment are to be taken
in the county courts only, on a particular day, and in a special place,
four times a year : that is, instead of having(a special nomination of
recognitors at the discretion of the sheriff for each case, all such
business is to be concentrated in quarterly courts of the whole shire.
But further, these assizes are to be taken by the king's itinerant
justices, with the assistance oifour knights of each county chosen by
the county court. Here, then, the principle of election is clearly
stated, and the concentration of the assizes at the county court of
course made that plan of election as certainly feasible as the earlier
practice of holding them at the discretion of the sheriff, or of the
curia regis, made it difficult. A similar rule is laid down in clause
48 of Magna Carta for the inquiry into forest grievances by twelve
sworn knights of each county, to be chosen per probos homines ejus-
dem comitatus.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN 305

This being so, at what period between 1176 and 1215 are we to Point of
look for the transition from the principle of nomination to that of elec- from uomi-
tion? We naturally should fix it at the point of time at which the Section
special assizes for which the knights representative were required
were concentrated in the county court ; and that appears definitely
to be the assize of 1194 now before us, the second chapter of which
specifies among the capitula for which the grand jury is to answer
all recognitions and all pleas which have been summoned before the
justices by writ of the king or chief justice, or sent before them
from the chief court of the king ; whilst the 18th article includes the
cases of Great Assize also, where the land in dispute is below a
certain value. Not only is there no extant assize earlier than this
in which the principle is laid down, but there is the strongest possi-
ble ground for believing that no such document was issued between
1176 and 1194. I think then we may with great probability conclude TI»S point
that when the word eligendi is used for the appointment of the four to the year
knights of the shire, for the purpose of nominating the grand juries
of the hundreds, it means that they were elected by the county
court, as the 18th clause of Magna Carta describes, and as the later
parliamentary representatives were chosen.

A further argument in the same direction may be drawn from institution

of coroners

the 20th article of the assize of 1194, which directs that in every
county shall be chosen three knights and a clerk, guardians of the
pleas of the Crown. This direction is the origin of the institution
of coroners, who have always been and still are elected by the whole
body of the freeholders.

The creation of this new office, an elective office, and one which institution
relieved the sheriff from a considerable portion of his work, indicates coronership,
a disposition on the part of the justiciar to limit the sheriff's direct progress of e
exercise of judicial functions, which is in strict accordance with the PrufcipieVe
proposed examination into his fiscal exactions, to which reference has
been already made more than once, and which was intended to be

carried out this very year. It would appear that the tendency of the Function? of

11 iu u --a-, re t L-L. • the sheriff*

local magnates to use the sheriff s office for their own purposes was limited ns

too strong to be overcome by the mere personal and official changes principle™
carried out by Henry II., and that it was necessary to introduce an ground
organic modification of the functions of this ancient magistrate. The
time was not come at which the county court could be trusted to
elect the sheriff ; 1 the only alternative was to limit his functions.
It will be seen, on a general survey of the whole history of local ad-
ministration, that as the elective principle gained ground the
powers of the sheriffs were limited. The present assize not merely

1 Art. Super Cartas, cc. viii. and ix. Statutes of the Realm, i. 139, 140.

X

son

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVKDKN

peace, in
1196

Revival of
an earlier
custom

Knights

the conser-
vation of
the peace

Iter of 1198

Summary of
the consti-
tutional
measures
of Huberfe
ndmiuUtra-
tion

throws a large part of their duties on the elective coroners, but for
bids that the sheriff should be justiciar in his own sheriff wick, or any
county in which he has been sheriff since the coronation of Richard.
Magna Carta forbids that any sheriff, constable, coroners, or other
royal bailiffs, shall hold pleas of the Crown.

The oath for the conservation of the peace ordered by Hubert in
1195 to be taken by all men throughout the kingdom1 is a valuable
illustration of the permanence and adaptability of one of the very
ancient legal customs of the country. The laws of Canute direct
that every man above twelve years shall make oath that he will
neither be a thief nor cognisant of one ; 2 the Assize of Clarendon
was based upon the obligation of this oath, although it devolved the
execution of it upon a select body of knights and lawful men. It
is now revived in the earlier form : they shall swear that they will
keep the peace of our lord the king to the best of their ability ; that
they will not be thieves, or robbers, or receivers of them, nor in any
matter consent to them ; that when they learn the existence of
such criminals, they will do their best to take them and deliver them
to the sheriff ; that when hue and cry is raised they will follow, and
will deliver to the sheriff those who refuse or avoid the duty. This
oath is to be taken by all over the age of fifteen before knights
assigned for the purpose. These knights assigned appear to be the
lineal predecessors of the more modern justices of the peace. The
legislation of the reign of Henry III. incorporated the system of the
assize of arms with that of watch and ward and hue and cry, and the
whole of the measures existing for the conservation of the peace were
codified in Edward I.'s statute of Winchester. The assigned knights
of whom we read here for the first time become under Edward III.
able to try felonies, and are called justices of the peace. There does
not seem to be any ground for the assertion that these were at any
period elective functionaries.

These are, then, the judicial measures of Hubert Walter's justiciar-
ship. The directions for the iter of 1198, issued soon after his
resignation, contain no important change, unless the order that the
elections lor the Great Assize shall be taken before the itinerant
justices may be regarded as a repromulgation or extension of the
application of the elective principle to that process, which is unneces-
sary. The forest assize, reissued at the same time, varies but little
from the assize of Woodstock of 1184.

The principles which may be regarded as definitely worked out for
the first time in the archbishop's general administration are, the appli-
cation of direct taxation to personal estate and revenue ; the employ -

Hoveden, iii. 299.

Secular Dooms, cap. 21.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

307

Town
charters

ment of assessment by jury to determine the obligation of the culti-
vated lands to carucage ; the introduction of the representative
principle into the county administration on a scale hitherto unprece-
dented ; and the application of the elective process to the selection
of judicial representatives. That the last was not a mere accident
or coincidence may be shown, I think, from the fact that the first
extant charter of a town which contains the provision for the
election of its ruling magistrate is that of Lincoln, of 1194.1 This
privilege, which had been at an earlier period purchaseable by fine
for the particular occasion, is now made perpetual, and a precedent
for a large class of similar charters in the early years of the next
reign, during which the archbishop's influence with the king was
the strongest. But this opens up a subject far too complex and
extensive to be touched here.

III. The light shed by Hoveden, following the direction taken by niustra-
his predecessor, on questions of foreign history, was the subject of foreign
several pages of the preface to the second volume of this edition
(Rolls Series).2 The general statements made there I shall not repeat,
but content myself with pointing out the passages which especially
illustrate the value of the work in this regard.

1. The places which touch upon the history of the Emperor History of
Henry VI. are numerous, and though not of first-rate importance, f11lmi™^f,im
decidedly valuable in the comparative barrenness of the continental
authorities of the period. The chief of these are, the account of the
coronation by Celestine III.3 and of the consequent destruction of
Tusculum,4 derived probably from the canons of York who were
then at Rome, or from the members of Eleanor's retinue who had
visited the city at that time ; the particulars of the internal dissen-
sions of the German princes, which are brought out in the history of
the negotiations of Richard for his release ; 5 the hostile attitude of
the emperor towards France, which partly resulted from Richard's
release, and was partly the purposed effect of his diplomacy ; 6 the
cruelties and outrages committed by Henry in the Sicilian kingdom in
1194 ; 7 the German crusade of 1197 ; 8 the reverses of the imperial
arms in Sicily the same year ; 9 and the illness and death of Henry
himself, followed by the collapse for the moment of all his dynastic
plans in both Germany and Italy.10

2. The history of the empire, as distinct from the personal History of
history of Henry VI., is illustrated by the account of the election of «rf otfao Iv!

Fcedera, i. 52.

See above, pp. 181-199.

Vol. iii. p. 101.

Vol. iii. pp. 102-105.

Vol. iii. pp. 214, 232, 234.

6 Vol. iii. pp. 300, 302, 303.

7 Vol. iii. 268-270.

* Vol. iv. pp. 25-27, 28, 29.
9 Vol. iv. pp. 27, 30.
10 Vol. iv. pp. 30, 31, 32.

x 2

MOM

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGER OF HOVEDEN

HUtory of
the papacy

Illustration
of the his-
tory of
Rome

HUtory of
Prance

History of

.ScotUitnl

the Emperor Otho IV.,1 and his subsequent struggle with Philip of
Swabia, as well as by the precedent notices of the adventures of the
children of Henry the Lion. As William of Winchester, the
younger brother of Otho, was brought up in England, and resided at
the court of Richard during a part at least of the later years - of our
chronicler ; as the intercourse, moreover, between Otho and Richard,
although not between Otho and John, was continuous and friendly,
it is easy to account for the special value of these particulars in the
prevailing barrenness of the foreign writers of the time. The details
of Otho's election, although not above legal and antiquarian
criticism, are of great authority. Of the commissioners who
attended on Richard's behalf, the bishop of Durham, Philip of
Poictiers, was, in all probability, in constant intercourse with Roger
of Hoveden, living at Howden, and having been as a royal clerk or
chaplain acquainted with him in earlier years ; another, William de
Chimeli, was archdeacon of Richmond ; another, the count of
Aumale, was the great potentate of the East Riding. From one of
these, or from some person in the retinue of one of them, our author
must have received his information ; it is even possible that he him-
self attended the bishop of Durham on the occasion.3

8. Hoveden's contributions to the history of the papacy are not
so large as might be expected from the continuous communication
existing during his period between York and Rome ; the most
important, perhaps, are the accounts of the attempt made by
Celestine III. to influence the choice of his successor,4 and of the
early reforms of Innocent III.5 He has, however, preserved one
detail of considerable importance touching the municipal condition
of the city of Rome, the history of the change in the senatorship in
1194, with the short review of the previous condition of that
magistracy.6

4. French history is so closely connected with English during
the whole reign of Richard and the portion of John's reign which is
embraced by the chronicle, that it is unnecessary to point out any
special passages that throw light upon it. The measures taken by
Philip to obtain a divorce,7 his dealings with the Jews,8 and his
conduct of the quarrel between the university and citizens of Paris,9
are the best instances of our author's contribution to the separate
history of France.

5. The same may be said of Scotland. Of incidents of purely
Scottish history, the transactions of William the Lion with Harold

Vol. iv. pp. 37-39, 95, 122.
Vol. iv. pp. 79, 116.
Vol. iv. p. 37.
Vol. iv. pp. 32, 33.
Vol. iv. pp. 41, 44, 45.

• Vol. iii. p. 270.

• Vol. iii. pp. 224, 306, 307 ; vol. iv.
p. 112.

• Vol. iv. pp. 118, 119.

• Vol. iv. pp. 120, 121.

THE CHRONICLE OF ROGEE OE HO V EDEN 309

MacMadit,1 and his negotiations for the marriage of his daughter
with Otho of Saxony,2 are specially noticeable. Hoveden's exact
details on the subject of the homage at Lincoln in 1200 and the
negotiations that led to it are very valuable.3 So is also his story
about William's intention of invading England at the beginning of
John's reign, an intention which he gave up in consequence of a
dream or vision which he had when spending the night at
Dunfermline, the burial-place of his great-grandmother, S. Margaret.1
The statement of our author5 that in the year 1197 the king of imitation of
Scots introduced into his dominions the oath for conservation of the institutions
peace which had been prescribed in England in 1195 may seem bytheScots
startling to those antiquaries who insist that the English reforms in
law and police had been anticipated by King David, and were in fact
borrowed from him by Henry II. ; but there can be no doubt that it
is a statement that throws light on a very obscure subject, and
affords a glimpse of the process of imitation by which Scotland was
assimilating herself to England in matters of the sort : a process
which continued until the wars of Edward I. threw her upon the
French alliance, and caused her to adopt the French in preference to
the English constitutional principles of law and government.

6. The few obscure notices given by Hoveden of the affairs of scanaiua-
Norway under Swerre Birkbain,6 are important chiefly as showing a
certain amount of national intercourse, and of the interest that still
existed in England as to the history of the northern kingdoms.

These instances will be, I think, sufficient to show both the value other iu*-

. .-., • -I j i • i i • • i i -i torical illus-

of our Chronicle, the painstaking exactness of its author, the sound- tuition*
ness of his means of information, and the amount of intelligence as
to foreign affairs which prevailed around him. The notices of
Spanish and Oriental history are of less importance, and have,
although recorded within a very few years of the time at which the
events occurred, acquired from distance a tinge of the legendary
character which diminishes their value.

1 Vol. iv. pp. 10-12. 5 Vol. iv. p. 33.

2 Vol. iii. pp. 298, 299, 308. " Vol. iii. pp. 270, 272 ; vol. iv.

3 Vol. iv. pp. 88, 91. p. 25.

4 Vol. iv. p. 100.

310

MEMORIALS OF THE KEIGN OF RICHARD I.

I.

ITINERARIUM.

[THE Itinerarinm Regis Bicardi was probably the work of Richard the
Canon of the Holy Trinity in Aldgate. Richard the Canon may have
been in the service of the Templars, and may have become prior of the
House. Whoever the author may have been, the work was early regarded
as one of taste and beauty. It is superior in style to that of Matthew of
Paris, though inferior in matter and method. In the Itinerarium
Richard I.'s part in the Third Crusade is fully described by a writer
who was evidently well acquainted with the Holy Scriptures. In the
Preface Bishop Stubbs draws an admirable picture of Richard I.,
comparing his character with that of Saladin. He then sketches the
history of the Crusades.]

THERE are periods in the history of all nations which are neither
seed-times of great principles nor harvests of great results. They are
the seasons during which the institutions of earlier policy are spread-
ing wide and striking deep below the surface of society, its spirit
working into the heart and life of the people, and its fruits growing
and ripening before the beginning of a new development. These
periods may be longer or shorter, as the growth of principles is retarded
or fostered : accordingly as rulers force their propagation by repress-
ing them, or moderate it by training and guidance. If they are
longer they have a series of heroes of a type of character peculiar to
themselves. If they are shorter they have at least the old age of the
men who have established the principles, and the youth and training
of those who are to work out the further steps of progress. But
anyhow they are richer in materials for the student of national and
personal character than in topics for the constitutional historian.
The former will find abundant details of adventure and elucidations
of manners : the latter, unless he is well supplied with records, in
which he may trace the workings of the institutions that are not less
a part of the nation's life because they are uninteresting to the super-
ficial reader, can only guess here and there at what is going on

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 811

amongst those whose lives are not written, and is tempted to indulge
in the visions of a speculative philosophy of history.

The short reign of Eichard the First shares in some measure the
character of these periods, for it falls between the initiation of good
principles of law under Henry II., and the development of
good principles of government in the reign of John : it is barren of
incidents for the constitutional historian, partly because the working
of the institutions of the former reign was impeded, as it had been
during the last years of Henry's life, by domestic strife and anarchy,
partly because the character and occupations of the king were not
such as to produce any striking effect in the acceleration or retard-
ing of progress. If John had succeeded his father immediately,
Magna Carta might have dated ten years earlier than it did ; or if
Richard had reigned twice as long as he did, it might have dated ten
years later ; but in the latter case it would have been rather the
absence than the presence of any policy on the king's part that made
the difference.

Short, however, as the reign was, its peculiar circumstances rob
it of the proper interest that belongs to shorter periods of transition.
It did not witness the declining glories of the statesmen of Henry,
nor form a school of training for those who were to resist King
John. The former were spent and worn out in the very beginning
of it. Of the latter it would be difficult to mention any, except
William Marshall, who occupy even a secondary place of interest in
the reign of Richard. It has its warriors and politicians all to itself.
The roll of the latter is not a long one. Hubert Walter, William
Longchamp, Walter of Coutances, Geoffrey FitzPeter, and William
Marshall were about all. In the class of warriors the king himself
throws all others into second rank : few of his companions in arms
were native Englishmen, or even Anglicised Normans. The chief
field of their exploits was too remote, and the time of their adventures
too short, for them to produce any effect on the national character,
and that produced by the character of Richard himself was neither
immediate nor direct. The siege of Acre used up the brave men that
his father had left him, and his French wars those whom he had
himself formed in the triumphs and troubles of the Holy Land.
He was the creation and impersonation of his own age ; l and that,
though full of character and adventure, was short and transitory in its
very essence ; but it was by a rare fatality that the lives of the men
of the transition were as short and transient as itself.

Still, although it furnishes little that is of interest to the invest! -

1 'Cum quo, multoruni juclicio, ' 1'roh dolor in tanto funere mundus
decus et honor militiro pariter sepulta obit.' Hoveden, 450. 'Rex tuus est
sunt.' M. Paris, cd. Wats, p. 196. speculum, quo te speculata superbis.'

312 MEMORIALS OF THE KK1ON OF RICHARD I.

gator of domestic legislation,1 it is not to the mere details of adven-
ture or of character that it owes the charm it possesses for those who
study history for its own sake. Anyone who will follow King
Richard carefully through the ten years of his reign will be brought
into contact with a variety of men, and complications of politics
unequalled in interest by those of many longer and more important
reigns. The Crusade brings East and West together. The family
connexions of the king involved him in the conflicting interests of
Italy, France, Germany, and Spain. His personal adventures open
up the whole political history of the age. The dominions in which
he exercised real or nominal sway were more diversified in character
and circumstances than those of any prince of his time. King of Eng-
land, lord of Ireland, Scotland, and Wales, duke of Normandy,
Aquitaine, and Gascony, count of Maine, Anjou, and Poictou, and
superior lord of Brittany, Auvergne, and Toulouse ; king of Aries,
conqueror of Cyprus, and for a time the ruler of the kingdom of Pales-
tine, he was brought into collision with almost every potentate in
Christendom. In his continental dominions he had an unwearied
enemy in Philip of France ; in Sicily he involved himself in quarrels
with both the Norman Tancred and the German Henry; in
Cyprus he not only startled the fitful lethargy of the Eastern empire,
which almost thought that the yellow-haired king from the West was
coming,2 before whom the golden gate of Constantinople was to open
of its own accord, but afforded a ground of accusation to enemies
who might be thought far enough removed from the interests of
the Comneni.3 In Palestine he managed either by his superior
prowess to draw on himself the envy, or by his utter want of tact to
alienate the goodwill and sympathy, of every prince of East or West
with whom he had to do. He had no policy abroad any more than

Galf. Vinsauf, Ars Poetica, ed. Leyser, Leopold's grandfather were half-

Helmstadt, 1724, p. 16. brothers. Conrad of Montferrat's

1 Palgrave, preface to the Rotuli mother was sister to the one and half-
Curice. Regis, i. Ixx. This introduction sister to the other. Richard's con-
contains the clearest account I know duct to Leopold stirred up the whole
of the domestic history of Richard's race sprung from Agnes of Suabia : in
reign. Germany, Italy, and Sicily. The

2 Ralph de Diceto, 642; Hoveden, affair of Cyprus was only a pretext.
370. Isaac was a usurper and a rebel : and

* Isaac Comnenus, emperor of Richard was welcomed by the Cypriots
Cyprus, was sister's son to the Em- as a deliverer. Yet, when a charge
peror Manuel. Hoveden, 340. Theo- against him was wanted, Leopold and
dora, the mother of Leopold of Austria, Henry took up the canse of Isaac as a
was a niece of Manuel. Ansbert, the family matter. Cf. R. Coggeshall, ad
Austrian chronicler, calls this connex- 1193 ; Hoveden, 414 v° ; where Leo-
ion the ' efficiens causa ' of Richard's pold is called uncle to Isaac's daughter,
captivity (ed. Dobrowsky, p. 114). Agnes, sister of Philip of France, was
The affinity between the Emperor married to Alexius II. Comnenus, \\ ho
Henry and Isaac Comnenus must have died in 1183.
been very distant ; Henry's father and

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 313

at home, and his foreign relations were as anomalous and unquiet as
his domestic ones. And with all this, besides the undoubted influence
which his personal character gave him in his own dominions, he had
power to place one of his nephews on the throne of Godfrey of
Bouillon, and other on that of Charles the Great.1

Brought thus into contact with so many and diverse interests,
and occupying, by his own position and choice, a central place in the
history of his times, Eichard has been portrayed for us, if not from
more distinct points of view, at least by a greater number of
historians than any sovereign of his age or any king of England be-
fore him. We know what Englishman, Norman, Frenchman, German,
Greek, and Mussulman thought about him ; and it is no wonder,
considering the number of princes whom he either outshone by his
exploits, or offended by his pride, or injured by active aggression, or
who, having injured him, hated him with the pertinacity of injustice,
that his character has fared badly in the hands of foreign chroniclers.

The descriptions given by the French and German writers are
frequently inconsistent with each other, and are based upon proofs
that will not bear historical inquiry ; 2 but they are rather exaggera-
tions and misrepresentations of existing facts than accusations alto-
gether false. There is indeed a contrast between the writers of the
two nations that is of some interest and importance as illustrating
the source and growth of national prejudice, while at the same
time it vouches for their own sincerity. The German historians
describe Eichard as a monster of pride and arrogance,3 the French

1 The steps of the promotion of into an act of hostility to the Emperor
Henry of Champagne to the kingdom Henry VI. Annales Marbacenses,
of Jerusalem are detailed in the fifth Pertz, xvii. 164. Richard is charged
book of this history. He was half- with selling Ascalon to the Saracens ;
nephew to both Philip and Richard, Ansbert, 112.

being grandson of Lewis and Eleanor ; 3 Otto of St. Blaise, a partisan of
but he had attached himself through- the emperor and Duke Leopold, in-
out to Richard's party in Palestine. veighs against Richard on the most
The election of Otto IV., who was son curiously imaginary grounds. He
of Henry the Lion, and Matilda, sister says of Richard after the surrender of
of Richard, and made count of Poictou Acre, ' Pneter h sec [the insult offered
by his uncle, is stated to have been to the duke's flag] prada communi uni-
carried either by Richard's influence or versorum sudore acquisita, inter suos
in hopes of his support : ' Ricardus tantum distributa, reliquos privavit, in
vero rex cum multis expensis eum ad seque odia omnium concitavit. Om-
imperium transmisit. O laudabilis nibus enim fortiori militum robore
viri laudabile factum, qui totum mundi prsestabat, et ideo pro velle sua
imperium nepoti suo comparavit.' cuncta disponens, reliquos principes
Robertde Monte, App. ad Sigebertum ; parvipendebat. Attamen Teutonica
ap. Pistorium, ed. Struve, i. 939. Cf. militia cum Italica his admodum
Conrad Ursperg. (ed. 1540), p. cccxxi ; exasperata, regi in faciem restitisset
Hoveden, 441 v°, &c. Otto was not nisi auctoritate militum Templi re-
crowned emperor until 1209. pressa fuisset. Anglican! itaque per-

2 For example, the capture of ridiam detestantes, Anglieeque subdi
Messina from Tancred is construed dedignantes, ascensis navibus simul

814 .MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

as the most perfidious of men. But the Germans have envenomed
their calumny with a hatred that is absent altogether from the
French historians ; and what is more to the point, they look upon him
as an Englishman and involve his country in his condemnation.

The ancient friendship between Germany and England, which
dated from the times of Boniface and Charles the Great, had reached
its point of closest connexion in the time of Edward the Confessor,
and had been resuscitated for a time by the marriage of Henry V.
with Matilda of England. But the tie between the house of Anjou
and that of Brunswick, which, originating in the marriage of Henry
the Lion with Matilda the daughter of Henry II., was drawn tighter
by the misfortunes of the Welfic family, was not looked upon in
Germany in the same light in which the old national friendship had
been. The English name shared the unpopularity of the defeated
party of the Welfs even before the conduct of Richard in Sicily
and Palestine had given umbrage to Henry of Hohenstaufen and
Leopold of Austria.1 Offence once given, a long score was soon
recollected for revenge, and a hope succeeded that some of the
English gold which hitherto had been spent in support of Henry the
Lion might be diverted without dangerous violence into the coffers of
the imperial house. National alienation on the one hand, party
animosity and personal enmity on the other, were fruitful causes of
hatred. Then, when malice had its worst, there was the conscious-
ness of wrong done and the desire of national justification to induce
the writers of Germany to represent Richard as they have done.

With the French it was otherwise. Richard was to them a
perfidious and faithless vassal.2 But that was all. They knew he
was no Englishman : and, if it is not an anachronism to speak of

cum Duce Leopaldo repatriaverunt, burg. ed. Giles, p. 108. The story is

rege cum suis adhuc remanente, thus told by several of their writers,

quotidieque paganos impugnante.' who show the same spiteful pleasure

Urstisius, Oermanice Hist. Illustr. ed. in telling it that the English writers

1670, vol. i. p. 216. A similar view of show in the details of the nmtrimo-

Richard's character is taken by nial disappointments of Philip of

Ansbert, though with more modera- France.

tion : ' Idem itaque rex Anglite primus ' Henry II. 's policy in Germany

et prsecipuus in tota militia Chris- was not altogether unlike that of

tiana, eo quod in facultatibus et in James I. in similar circumstances,

omnibus opibus alios praecedebat, et His political sympathies were doubt-

eos aspernatus postponebat, dominium less with the emperor, but his family

sibi super omnes usurpabat,' p. Ill ; connexion went the other way. He

and further on, ' Rex Angliaa Richur contented himself with pecuniary

dus, qui gloria omnes anteire voliiit. support, and that to no great extent,

et omnium indignationem ineruit," and so was no favourite with either

\c.. p. 113. The English historians party.

seem to have been peculiarly offended • et quo

with the German ones for representing ' Anglorum sceptris melior non pnrfui :

Richard's capture to have taken place unquam

whilst he was cooking. Chron. Petro- ' Si regi sen-are fidem cui subditus esse

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 315

any national feeling in a Frenchman of that age, to accuse him of
national faults would have been to accuse themselves. He was,
according to their reading of his character, a brave and most noble
king ; the most glorious of the kings of the earth if he would but
have kept faith with Philip : and that was the concern of Philip, not
of France. He was jealous of Philip's glories and faithless to Philip's
allegiance. The former charge is not brought in so many words by
any contemporary historian, and we may easily guess why. Philip's
laurels were yet to be won, when Richard's career was closed, and
such as they were, they were won in the far different field of feudal
chicanery. But the charge of perfidy is freely brought, and, so far as
the facts go, cannot be rebutted. The moral and political guilt, how-
ever, of such perfidy was infinitesimal. The relation of suzerain
and vassal was at this period antiquated, and indeed extinct, except
where it served the purpose of the moment to drag it into a legal
procedure, or where the suzerain was strong enough to enforce rights
which were supported rather by his own strong hand than by the
' main et bouche ' of his vassal. Between a mighty prince like
Richard and the venerable imposture of the French monarchy there
could be no real tie of homage and fealty ; nor probably would the
plea have been brought against Richard had not he himself taught
Philip the use of it in his struggles with his father and his brothers.
Any war waged by the duke of Normandy or the count of Anjou
against the king of France was construed into perfidy, and the craft
and cunning of war, as it was then practised, into fraud and
treachery. Richard was not a king who would have encouraged
rebellion in the dominions of an ally, at the same time disavowing
his share in it : but he was not like Frederick Barbarossa, one who
would send a cartel of defiance to an infidel foe before he waged war ;
much less would he have denied himself any advantage that craft
or speed could give him over an enemy who hated him, and whom
he despised so heartily as Philip. They were at war, open or secret,
during the whole of Richard's reign, and neither ever scrupled to
steal a march upon the other.

Richard has suffered hardly less from the exaggerated praise of
English writers, who, while they have honestly recorded the crimes
and excesses which on the face of it refute their views of his general
character, seem to have thought it possible to show that, although

1 Lege tenebatur, Regemque timere It is clear that Philip had craft

supremum enough to put Richard legally in the

' Cura fuisset ei.' wrong. Compare his intolerable

— succedit ei quo pejor in orbe teasing of Richard at Messina, as

' Non fuit, omnimoda vacuus virtute told by Rigord, ed. Pithceus, p. 189,

Johannes.'— (W. Brito, Philippis, and at Acre. Ibid,
v. p. 292, ed. Pithceus.)

816 MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD J.

in every relation of life he was found grievously wanting, he was,
on the whole, a great and glorious king, to be defended against the
calumnies of all the world. Those of them who lived under John
may be excused for taking a flattering view of the past in contrast
with the miserable and disgraceful present. Those who remembered
his father's government wondered, but could not deny, that the
foolish people bore Richard's scorpions more willingly than they had
done his father's rods.1 A bad son, a bad husband, a selfish ruler,
and a vicious man, he yet possessed some qualities which the men of
the time accepted as better than the wicked wisdom of his father,
and which made his tyranny less intolerable than his brother's weak-
ness ; besides that, his glory and renown reached thousands of homes
too humble to suffer from his exactions : he himself, with his
oppressive hirelings, was far away from England, but fame had its
myriad tongues. With John there was no glory, and not even the
enchantment of distance to modify the bitter sense of national shame
and personal suffering. Surely the historians were not so very far
wrong, as modern thinkers, judging on high moral principles, might
suppose. Judged according to the standard of his own time, he was
acquitted of much for which we must condemn him ; judged by that
of ours, he carries with him in his condemnation the age that tolerated
or admired him. Still there were a few redeeming points in him
that should mitigate the censure of the moralist, and may force him
to grant that in a better age Richard might have been a better and
as great a man.

Richard was no Englishman that we should be concerned to
defend him on national grounds, if it were right to argue to a fore-
gone conclusion. Nothing in regard of national character or glory
depends on his vindication or condemnation. He had very little
English blood in his veins ; most of his prominent characteristics
were inherited, and are traceable with little obscurity to his Norman,
Angevin, and Poictevin ancestors. His strength of will, his love of
war, his unscrupulousness in means and money, his recklessness of
human life, seem to have been his indefeasible inheritance from the
Red King 2 and Henry I. His eloquence, such as it was, may have
come to him with his troubadour tastes from his mother. We have
to go back to his great-grandfather, King Fulk of Jerusalem, to find

1 William of Newburgh (ed. Hamil- ard's death, De Instr. Princ. p. 176.

ton), i. 285, comparing the reign of (ed. Brewer, 1846). There is a good

Henry with that of Richard, under deal of likeness between the worst

whom he wrote, says, ' Et tamen popu- points of Richard's character and that

lus insipions cum minori nuncquerela of William Rufus ; but William seems

scorpion ibuscteditur, quam anteannos to have been quite devoid of Richard's

aliquot flagellis ctedebatur.' nobler traits.

* Cf. Giraldus's remarks on Rich-

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 317

the source of the spirit of knight-errantry which is so strongly
exemplified in the work before us. This was not the whole of
Richard's character. His power of winning the love of better men,1
his wonderful facility in pardoning personal injuries, his tact in the
choice of ministers, so inconsistent with his want of it in the rest of
his conduct ; a certain blundering faith in human nature, slow to
suspect evil in the worst of men ; and the heroic side as contrasted
with the merely adventurous side of his character, came to him
certainly from no ancestor nearer than the good Queen Maud : if
they were not inherited from her, they were his own especial gifts :
he was the first of his family who possessed them.2

The leading feature in Eichard's character was the love of war,3
and that not for the sake of glory or acquisition of territory, but as
other men love science or poetry, for the mere delight of the struggle
and the charm of victory. By this his whole temperament was
toned : united with the genius for military affairs which he un-
doubtedly possessed, it called forth all the powers of his mind and
body. It brought into play the few virtues which alone can save
such heroes from being scourges of mankind. It was the occasion
of most of the sins that were laid to his charge, and of most of the
miseries that oppressed his people during his reign. For this ruling
passion he condescended to the meanest tricks of avarice,4 the most

1 See Mr. Dimock's Metrical Life trem, strenuitas et animositas eximia,

of S. Hugh ; Lincoln, 1860, p. vii. largitas et dapsilitas immensa semper

- The favourable characters of laudabilis in principe, caeterasque ador-

Richard are by Gervase of Tilbury, nans virtutes, tarn animi quam verbi

Otia Imperialia, ap. Leibnitz, Scrip- firma constantia.' See also the last

tores Rerum Brunsvicensium, i. 947. chapter of these Memorials, Rolls

' Post hunc genitus floruit ille rex re- Series ; and Matthew Paris, p. 373, 374.

gum terrenorum Ricardus in strenui- 3 This characteristic he shared with

tate, magnanimitate, militia, scientia, his elder brother. ' Ei'at eis mens

et omnis generis virtutibus nulli se- una, videlicet, plus creteris posse in

cundus ; sacri patrimonii Jesu Christi, armis.' Hoveden, 331. It is need-

Terrseque Sanctse strenuus defensor ; less to multiply references,

timor Gentilium, mors hostium, 4 Richard was not avaricious in the

gladius et tutamen Christianorum : cui proper sense of the word, but as most

mundus ad largitiones non sufficeret, extravagant people are. Sir Francis

et orbis velut pugillus erat ad dimi- Palgrave (pref. to Rot. Cur. Reg. i. p.

candum : ' in the Chronicle of Tours xli) is much too hard upon him.

(Martene and Durand, Amplissima And the reproach taken by Giraldus

Collectio, v. 1037), ' Vir quidem ani- from an epigram (De Inst. Princ. p.

mosus ac bellicosus, donis largissimus, 176,Brompton 1280), that heembezzled

armis strenuissimus, militari negotio the money of the Crusade, is absurd,

circumspectus, a militibus dilectus et The amount of money that he had

a clero et populo honoratus, ecclesise spent on the Crusade must have been

patronus et divini officii auditor inde- immense, including the spoils of Sicily

fessus ; ' Giraldus, De Instructione and Cyprus. Rigord coolly praises

Principum, p. 105, ' Inter varias qui- Philip's generosity in accepting a

bus praeeminet virtutes peculiari third of the money extorted from

quadam prserogativa, trina hunc in- Tancred, when he had no right to a

signia incomparabiliter reddunt illus- single Angevin, p. 188. The story

818 MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

unscrupulous violence of oppression ; for this he incurred the impu-
tation of wanton cruelty and causeless perfidy, and for this he
squandered with the most fatuous prodigality the treasures which he
had amassed at the sacrifice of honour and faith.

In such a man we do not expect to find much self-restraint or
consideration for other men's weakness. We dare not assert that
Richard was free from the more sordid vices that defiled the
character of his father and brother. The standard of morality was
indeed so low that even if the historians were altogether, as they are
for the most part, silent as to his personal vices, their silence could
not be taken for a negation. Had he been in any considerable
degree free from such, the praises of his chastity and temperance
could not fail to have been sung by some one or other of his
admirers. Unhappily, what little is said is dark and condemnatory.1
His sins were such as called for open rebuke and bitter penitence.
On two occasions before his last confession on his death-bed,2 he is
recorded to have publicly exhibited an extreme agony of remorse,
and to have done open penance for the foulness of his life. Coming,
however, as he does between Henry and John, to whose history their
personal vices give so strong a colouring, he may at least plead that
his sins in this respect, whatever they may have been, were neither
so heinous as theirs, nor, what is more to the point, were allowed to
influence his public life. We do not read that he ever, for the mere
gratification of passion, either lost a friend or made an enemy, or
broke any of the laws of honour which the times recognised, or even
risked the smallest advantage. He was a soldier, and his vices were
the common vices of the camp, set off with no garnish of romance,
glaring in their own foulness and leaving us with no suspicion of
anything worse behind.

told of his attacking the castle of chapter from the Gesta Romanorum).

Chain/ in search of a treasure, on the These must be read with the recollec-

occasion on which he met his death, is tion that they are not to be interpreted

curious, and, if it is to be believed, in pessiinam partcm. The language

should be taken as a whole. The of the monkish writers is often indis-

treasure was, according to Rigord (p. criminate and exaggerated upon such

200), ' Imperator quidam de auro points.

purissimo, cum uxore et tiliis et filia- * First at Messintv, in 1190, Hove-

bus, ad mensam auream residentibus.' den, 388 ; secondly, on the Tuesday in

See also Hoveden, 449 V; Trivet, 160. Easter week, 1195, Hoveden, 428 ;

It is probable that the difficulties in and thirdly on his death-bed. See

which he found himself after his ini- the curious story of his release from

prisonment had the effect of increas- purgatory, in Matthew Paris, p. 873.

ing his unscrupulousness in exacting He had professed on his death-bed

money. See the curious passage in that he would gladly endure the pains

John of Oxenedes, pp. 94, 96. of purgatory until the day of judg-

1 The passages are, Hoveden, 428 ment : Trivet, 161. According to the

v° ; W. Newburgh, ii. 56 ; Heming- story by M. Paris, he was released the

burgh, i. 229 (where the history of same day with Stephen Langton and

Richard's death-bed reads like a one of his chaplains.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 319

He was a man of blood, and his crimes were those of one whom
long vise of warfare had made too familiar with slaughter to be very
chary or sparing of it when the cost was his own ; much less would
the scruples of humanity occur to him when the blood to be shed was
that of an open enemy or an infidel. But he was too impetuous to
be either treacherous or habitually cruel ; nor can any well-founded
charge of either vice be brought against him. The sacrifice of the
prisoners or hostages at Acre cannot be excused on any principle of
morality, but it was in strict agreement with the letter of the law.
It was no ebullition of savage passion, but a judicial cruelty which
had almost become a necessity, and which was not executed until
some weeks after it fell due and was seen to be necessary. The
prisoners had been spared subject to terms and ransom. The terms
might have been easily kept if Saladin had chosen. The massacre
was, moreover, a sort of reprisal on Saladin for his murder of the
Templars after the battle of Hittin.1

There is no evidence that connects the assassination of Conrad of
Montferrat with any proceeding of Eichard ; such a crime implies a
fault of which all the rest of his life proves him guiltless, and an
amount of imprudence beyond even his political incapacity. He
might, had he compassed such a design, have certainly foreseen that
it would be charged upon himself ; and he might assuredly have
effected the purpose by much simpler means. It was perpetrated at
a moment when he was fast losing his interest in the Crusade, and
anxious to go home ; at a time, therefore, when the old complica-
tions hung light upon him, and he would be particularly careful
about entangling himself in new ones. The charge was never made
in a more tangible form than as a rumour or a suspicion : it is
impossible to suppose that, had the family of Conrad believed it, his
brother should have taken service under Richard as he did ; 2 in fine,

1 The account given by Bohadin fused, insisting that the Saracen cap-

(Vita Saladini, ed. Schultens), pp. tives should not he surrendered until

181-183, is important, as illustrating all was paid. Saladin, suspecting that

Saladin's policy and the Oriental view Richard intended to keep both

of Richard's conduct ; and may be prisoners and ransom, refused to trust

compared with the details of our author, to his honour; and hence the miser-

iv. 2, 3, 4. On the expiration of the able result. This is probably the

first month from the surrender of Acre, truth, and it explains why the Saracen

the true cross was to be restored with princes looked on Saladin as, in a

100,000 pieces of gold and six hundred measure, answerable for the massacre,

captives. Saladin was unable to make Hoveden says that Saladin massacred

up the number of captives, and en- all his Christian prisoners two days

deavoured to gain time by proposing before the slaughter by Richard, but

that the Saracen prisoners should be it is impossible that he should have

restored to him before the ransom was been guilty of so suicidal an act.

paid, on condition of his giving Hoveden, 397.

hostages and pledges for the perform- - Boniface of Montferrat in 111)7

ance of the conditions. Richard re- received of King Richard 800?. as his

820 MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

the character of C.mrad was such, and the persons whom he had
injured so many and various, that it is a wonder he was not disposed
of earlier than he was. His chief enemies were among the Greeks
and Pullani, the most likely of all enemies to seek a remedy by the
swords of the Assassins.

Richard's indomitable pride l and his carelessness of expressing
the contempt he felt for those beneath him in fame or strength
are constantly alleged against him by foreign writers, and are not
denied by his own panegyrists ; they were, indeed, the fruitful
causes of his misfortunes. Still it must have been a difficult thing
for the Lion-heart to have shown respect for one whom he knew so
well, and despised so justly, as he did Philip of France, or to have
pretended a regard for one so faithless and selfish as Conrad of
Montferrat. His conduct to so enthusiastic a pilgrim as Leopold of
Austria was, however, as indefensible as the meanness which avenged
it, and which leads us to suspect that Richard may have known
Leopold better than we do. Certainly the other instances may be
referred rather to a want of political tact. He was not so far wrong in
the contempt he felt as rash and headstrong in his way of showing it.

If he had the vices of an unscrupulous and impetuous soldier,
he had also the virtues of a brave man. His very impetuosity pre-
vented him from being selfishly cold-blooded, or employing the
artifices of falsehood and treachery. He was ready to forgive as he
was hasty to offend ; neither revengeful himself, nor suspicious
of such a fault in others ; he never forsook or betrayed a friend.
He was open-handed and magnificent to excess, a virtue which, by
itself, accounts for much of his popularity. He shared, in common
with many other great warriors, in that sincere yet formal attention
and attachment to ceremonial religion 2 which, considering the

fee, and 2GL 13s. 4d. as a present Series. That he was very popular

from the king. Stapleton's Rotnli with such of the clergy as he had not

Scaccarii Normanniag, ii. pref. xiv, cheated of their money is clear from

and 301. the honourable mention made of

1 See Oiraldus, De Instr. Prin. 107. him in the Obituary of Fontevraud :

He was ' ferocissimus ad ultionem," in the notes of the French editors

Newburgh, ii. 31 : ' rex vero propter of R. Coggeshall, Bouquet, xviii. 85.

magnitudinem animi ac virium, quos He was greatly honoured among

forte per mansuetudinem unire sibi the Cistercians. See Martene and

poterat, indignantis animi monens Durand, Thesaurus, iv. 1281, 1307,

exasperabat.' Ibid. ii. 72, and the pas- 1324, Ac. The day of his death was

sages from the German writers above. also kept at Canterbury Cathedral.

* He heard mass every day. R. to which he had granted Boughton-

Coggeshall. His care in collecting Blean in Kent, as a pledge of which he

relics is spoken of by Matthew Paris, sent his gloves to be hung up before

p. 374. He was on good terms with the altar. His anniversary was kept

the clergy. See note from the Chro- solemnly in choir and refectory ; each

nicle of Tours above, p. 317 ; also p. priest said a mass for him ; the rest

447 of the Memorials in the Rolls of the monks said the proper psalms.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 321

circumstances of a soldier's life, must be accepted by the moralist,
in default of any higher development, as the expression of a mind
which willingly and humbly recognises the source of all power and
might.

As a warrior, Richard was by no means a mere headstrong and
headlong combatant. He had that rare prerogative of true genius,
to be able to see the best plan of operations to be the best, even
when it did not proceed from his own brain. He was circumspect
in design and swift in execution ; * ready to seek and take the best
advice, to yield his own schemes and accept a subordinate position
when the decision of the majority was against him.

Skilful as he was in the designing, and earnest in the execution
of military combinations, he was the veriest tyro in politics. He
had none of the tact of a wise prince ; he showed none of the self-
restraint in the camp that he practised in the council- chamber. His
political alliances were formed on the merest grounds of likes and
dislikes ; he had no scheme of territorial aggrandisement, such as
gave a unity to the whole life of his father and of his competitor
Philip. His dangerous dalliance with Saladin and Saphadin,
purposeless in itself, was madness when persisted in, in defiance of
the advice and public opinion of the Crusaders. When Messina was
won, solely by his arms, he was easily persuaded to share the fruits
of victory with his faithless ally, although he might far more wisely
have used them to counteract his schemes. The rich and tenable
acquisition of Cyprus was cast away even more easily than it was
won. The whole history of his connexion with the Lusignans shows
that he was as ready to forgive old injuries as he was to shut his eyes
to future disadvantages, provided he could carry out the fancy of the
moment, whether it was founded on prejudice alone, or, as in that
particular case, on a prejudice that happened to be on the side of
right.

He was eloquent after a rude and effective fashion. Being
consciously unfit to govern men in peace, he did his best to choose
good ministers.2 Hence he cannot be looked on as a mere tyrant>

The expense was defrayed from the more celebrated in the might of war.'

revenue of the said estate. Martyro- P. 185 ; ' He was old in war, excellent

log. Cantuar. ad 8 id. April. MS. in counsel.' The proof of what is said

Lambeth, 20. in the text may be seen at large

1 Bohadin (p. 161) says of him : throughout the present work.
1 The king of England, strenuous before The praise which our author

all, magnanimous, of strong courage, (p. 447) gives Richard for loving the

ennobled by glorious battles, of fear- society of good men, whether deserved

less boldness in war. He was counted or not, is confirmed by Giraldus, De

less than the king of France in respect Inst. Pr. 106, who, comparing him

of his kingdom and dignity, but both with his brother Henry, points out

more flourishing in riches and much some characteristics which he un-

322 MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

although his designs could not he and were not carried out without
the use of means that amount in effect to tyranny. If he cannot be
acquitted on modern principles of deserting his direct and immediate
duty as a king for the chimerical honours of a Crusader, it may be
pleaded on his behalf that the means which he took to secure the
peace and happiness of his subjects before he left were such as would
have held good if he had had to deal with men of ordinary honesty.
The anarchy of his reign is rather to be ascribed to the ingratitude
and faithlessness of his brothers, and to the perfidy of Philip, than
to his own neglect. When he started on the Crusade, he bound his
brothers with an oath not to enter England for three years during
his absence ; and to the tie of honour he added that of interest,
loading them both with benefits, which might have shown them that
they had everything to lose and nothing to gain by breaking their
oath. He did not leave home until he could be accompanied by that
faithless ally from whom his most serious evils were to be appre-
hended. He could not have calculated on the desertion of Philip,
the perfidy of John, or his own imprisonment in Germany. If he
might have foreseen that the scum of the nobility who were left at
home would murmur against the humble origin of his minister, he
stands excused for his too great faith in men's honour. He might
have known, however, that he was taking with him to the East those
whose presence at home would have been his best safeguard. Had
he taken John, and Geoffrey, and Hugh of Puiset with him to the
Crusade, and left Ranulf Glanvill and Hubert Walter at home, it
would probably have changed the whole character of his reign. Nor
should it be forgotten that the personal presence of a Norman prince
had never been any guarantee of the happiness of England, whilst,
if it had, his dominions were so wide that the fulfilment of the
duty to one part of them involved the dereliction of it to the rest.

But all allowances being made for him, he was a bad ruler ; his
energy, or rather restlessness,1 his love of war, and his genius for it,
effectually disqualified him from being a peaceful one ; his utter
want of political common sense from being a prudent one. And
thus in this capacity he stands as far below the Norman princes as

cloubtedly possessed. ' Strenuitas illis iste malleus. Mnrtiis ille ludis »ul

et animi magnitude fere par, sed via dictus, hie seriis; ille extraneu, iste

virtutis valde dispar. Ille [Henry] suis ; ille omnibus, iste bonis. Ille

lenitate laudabilis et liberalitate ; iste magnanimitate mandum ambiebat,

severitate spectabilis et stabilitate. iste sibi de jure competentia non in-

Ille suavitate commendabilia, hie efficaciter appetebat.'
gravitate. Illi facilitas, huic constan- ' 'Regnavit autem satis laboriose

tia laudem peperit. Ille misericordia annis decem.' Hob. de Monte, 939 ;

conspicuus, iste justitia. Ille misero- R. Coggeshall, c. 857. ' Magnanimitas

rum et male meritorum refagium, iste nullo tempore simtinuit esse non

supplicium. Ille malorum clypeus, actuosa ' ; p. 447, in vol. R. S.

3IEMORIALS OF THE EEIGN OF RICHARD i. 823

he does in other respects above them. The delight of victory, as a
ruling passion, is less degrading to a king, and a cause of less shame
and suffering to his subjects, than the sordid passions of avarice and
lust, to which the first two Henries, in spite of their sagacity and
superior mental power, were wretchedly enslaved.

The great blot on Richard's character, as a ruler, was his wanton
disregard of good faith in regard to money, for which his military
exigencies gave occasion, but of which they afford no excuse. The
engagement that he would not have dreamed of forfeiting with a
brother warrior sat light upon him when it involved his faith to a
powerful bishop or a rich abbey, or a promise to an urgent influential
suitor. The bargains that he made before the Crusade, for the sale
of office and dignity,1 were not in themselves more disgraceful than
much else that prevailed in the public administration of the times ;
but the utter unscrupulousness exhibited in the repudiation of
promises and agreements after the money was received reminds one
of nothing more honourable than the dealings of the Turkish
government with its pashas, and of the pashas with their subjects.2

The relations of Richard with Henry II. can hardly be looked
upon as those of a son with his father. He was brought up as the
heir of his mother's house,3 and among a people more alive to her
wrongs than to her crimes. He had to endure what of all things is
most intolerable to an impetuous mind, to be made a tool of by his
father for purposes in which he had himself no interest. Alternately
the puppet and the victim of Henry's policy, betrothed for a political
purpose to a wife whom he was not allowed to marry,4 credibly
certified that his father had not scrupled to sacrifice her to his own
lust,5 as he had sacrificed his son's happiness to the mere desire of
acquiring territory, he might with reason look on Henry as the
source of constant misfortune and misery to him ; the persecutor of
his mother, the seducer of his betrothed wife, the instigator of the

1 Of. Palgrave, preface to the Botuli bably the cause of his vices, he was
Curies Regis, i. xli, and the authori- twice betrothed by his father, first in
ties there quoted : Benedict of Peter- 1159 to a daughter of Raymond
borough and Richard of Devizes. Berenger, count of Barcelona (Rob. de

2 His conduct to Stephen de Marzai Monte, p. 892), to whom Trivet gives
and Ranulf Glanvill, as recorded by perhaps confusedly the name of Be-
Richard of Devizes, are capital illus- rengaria (p. 46), and again in 1183 to
trations ; ed. Stephenson, pp. 6, 7. a daughter of Frederick Barbarossa,

3 ' Provida patris dispositione, pa- who died shortly after. Hoveden,
ternae nomen renuens, maternse stirpis 355 V.

honorem statim adeptus.' Girald. 5 Hoveden, 392 : ' In uxorem ducere

De Inst. Pr., 104. nulla ratione possit, quia rex Anglise

4 Besides the wretched betrothment pater suus earn cognoverat et filium
to Alesia of France, in 1168 (Joh. ex ea genuerat, et ad hoc probandum
Salisb. ep. 244), which was the burden multos produxit testes, qui parati
of his life from 1174 to 1191, and pro- erant modis omnibus hoc probare.'

Y2

824 MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

hostility of his brothers could claim indeed the allegiance of a feudal
inferior, but had little right to the affection of a son. Nor was the
tempter wanting. Philip was shrewd enough to take advantage of
the character and circumstances of his neighbour, and to use him as
the instrument of his own unscrupulous enmity against his father.
If all this cannot be regarded as an excuse for Richard's unfilial
conduct, it may, coupled with the consideration of his youth at the
time when he was first led into the attitude which, during Henry's
life, he more or less maintained, and with the sincerity of his
repentance, be allowed in mitigation of that condemnation which has
generally been visited upon his fault.

To such a man as Richard a new Crusade offered a prospect full
of charm : countless battles to fight and fortresses to take ; enemies
ready to hand in endless plenty, and those enemies worth conquering,
in the view of temporal and spiritual glory : a sovereign of mature
age and acknowledged reputation to humble ; a knight,1 moreover,
and one who prided himself on not being outdone by the Christian
chivalry in their own favourite virtues of honour and courtesy : a
quarrel long ago inveterate and which need never be reconciled ; a
battle-field whose associations of holiness and reverence were, perhaps,
to Richard's mind equalled by its fame in romance and in the true
history of its knightly conquerors : great fame to rival, and, perhaps,
greater yet to gain ; and with the persuasion all the while that he
was at once winning salvation by fighting God's battles and follow-
ing the occupation he loved best — in all this there was temptation
to the Lion-heart. Now he might put to proof the knowledge that
he had all his life been gaining, without having his triumph shortened
by the intrigues of politicians or by the obligation of taking fair terms
as from a Christian foe. For the feud between Christ and Mahomet
was an eternal one, and the limits that usage and mutual forbearance
placed on struggles between Christian princes had no existence when
the adversary to be humbled was an enemy of both God and man.
It was a struggle in which there could be no failure, for he was on

1 See p. 9 (vol. R. S.), where it for knighthood to a Chistian does not

is said that Saladin was knighted by appear, as some institution of the kind

the Constable Henfrid of Toron. The seems to have existed among the

French romance in which Saladin is Moslems. The Emir Karakoush, by

made the son of the countess of Pon- an anachronism equal to that of the

thieu, and which is followed by the French romance, is said by R. de

Chranique d'Outrenier, makes him Diceto, 654, to have been knighted by

apply for knighthood to Hugh of S. Kerbogha at the siege of Antioch.

Omer, lord of Tiberias. Histoirc We find a son of Saphadin knighted

Litttraire de In France, xxi. 681. by King Richard (vol. R. S. p. 825) ; so

But Hugh of 8. Omer died in 1107. thivt probably the value attached by

Will. Tyr. p. 798. He was the founder the Saracens depended rather on the

of Toron, which fact perhaps misled character of the bestower than on the

the romancer. Why Saladin applied nature of the rite.

MEMORIALS Olf THE REIGN OF RICHARD 1. 325

the side of the God of battles, in Whose service is perfect freedom,
and for Whom to perish is itself a most glorious victory. How very
different an undertaking he found really awaited him, and how soon
he was undeceived, we learn from a comparison of the work before
us with Bohadin's Life of Saladin.

Viewed side by side with the Saladin of history, Eichard does not
appear to advantage, though doubtless the inferiority is less than
when he is compared with the hero of romance or the figment of
historical unfairness. The superiority of Saladin seems to have been
rather in his character as a man than as a warrior or a ruler.
Richard was a Christian, Saladin a Moslem ; and we must judge the
latter by a more lenient standard, although the example of S. Lewis
and Edward I. had not yet taught the Western princes that a good
man may be a good king. In many respects there was a likeness
between the two ; both were generous, liberal, and honourable ; both
were famous captains, although Richard's exploits in war were far
above Saladin' s ; both were men of more cultivated mind than were
most of their fellows. The extravagances and cruelties of both were
on a like scale, and on the same principles. But we look in vain in
Richard for the profound love of truth and justice which were in
Saladin. Otherwise most of the differences were such as are at-
tributable to the different temperaments of East and West. Richard
used force where Saladin used contrivance. Richard was rude where
Saladin was courteous. Richard was haughty and impatient where
Saladin was patient and prudent. The circumstances in which these
differences were exemplified were similar ; both had to deal with
great hosts of divided and jealous warriors. The result showed that
Saladin's treatment of his allies was wiser than Richard's, and that
decided the struggle between them. Saladin was a good heathen,
Richard a bad Christian ; set side by side there is not much to choose
between them ; judged each by his own standard there is very much.
Could they have changed faith and place, Saladin would have made
a better Christian than Richard, and Richard, perhaps, no worse
heathen than Saladin ; but Saladin's possible Christianity would
have been as far above his actual heathenism as Richard's possible
heathenism would have been above his actual Christianity.

* * * * -* *

The condition of Palestine had been a source of sorrow and
shame to Christendom for more than four hundred years before the
first Crusade.1 The capture of Jerusalem by Chosroes in 614 was

1 Jerusalem was taken by Chosroes was taken by the Turks about 1077 ;

in 614 ; recovered by Heraclius in628 ; covered by the Fatimite Caliph, 1096 ;

taken by Omar in 637 ; fell into the taken by Godfrey, July 15, 1099.

hands of the Fatimite Caliphs about 969; Our author, at p. 22 (R. S.), states that

826 MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

the decisive sign that told the East what had been long known in
the West, that the power of the Roman Empire had come to an end.
It had shared the fate of all empires founded and built up as it had
been by warlike aggression. It was not luxury alone that destroyed
it, for the period of its greatest licence was also that of its widest
sway ; but the energies that had been strong, so long as new worlds
remained to be conquered, became weak and ineffective in triumphant
peace. The time came for defence, but no power of defence was
found, only the walls that the sons of the builders were too weak to
man, and engines which answered to no hands less skilful or less
mighty than theirs who framed them. The Moslem power was
victorious, not because it was irresistible, but because there was
nothing to resist it. The spasmodic effort by which Heraclius was
enabled to recover Palestine from the Persians was over when the
greater foe came, and the fanatical hosts before whom the Persian
himself had fallen.

During those four centuries it had been almost an impossibility
for either East or West to attempt a rescue. The Byzantine state
had had more than enough to do to maintain its existence against
external enemies ; and the West was passing through that Medean
caldron from which it was to rise renewed and strengthened for
fresh strifes. Meanwhile the city of God lay waste, and the
abomination of desolation standing in the holy place seemed to be a
sign of the approaching end of the world. When the tenth century
closed without the expected arrival of the judgment day, and
Christendom saw before it a long prospect of extension and glory
under its new lease of life, the thoughts of men turned quickly
towards Palestine. Pilgrimages began to multiply. It was no
longer here and there that a stray palmer, a monk or bishop from
the West, having overcome strange difficulties and undergone
strange adventures, returned, one out of a thousand, to tell of the
sad state of the ' Land of Pilgrimage.' Great bands organised their
expeditions together ; and when they came home they reported that,
although the conduct of the pagans to strangers was as cruel and
oppressive as ever, their power, for the same reason that the power
of Rome had fallen, was approaching its fall, and what had been

it bad been in tbc bands of tbe Turks quadringentos sbould be read. Tbc

for forty years wben Godfrey took it ; passage is otherwise confused in all

\Villiam of Tyre (p. 633) says 88 ; tbe MSS. : two of them make the

either this is a mistake, or refers to occupation by the Christians to have

some short unrecorded occupation by lasted 9(i years instead of 89 ; and tbe

the Turks about 1000. It is to be ob- other two place the date of the capture

served, however, that the word used is in 11H8 instead of 1187. The same

not Turks but Gentiles, which leads to confusion of the well-known date is

a suspicion that for ' quadraginta ' found at p. 5 (R. 8.).

MEMOKIALS OF THE EEIGN OF KICHAKD I. 327

lost in the paralysis of imperial energy might be regained by a
united effort of Western feudalism.

At the time, however, that the East was ripe for conquest the
West was not ready to reap it. Jerusalem changed masters, but it
fell into the hands of the Turks, not of the Christians. And it was
not until nearly thirty years after that the Western powers were
roused to united action, or even able to entertain the idea of a joint
expedition. The European states had by that time emerged from
chaos. The quarrels of Henry IV. with the popes had not availed
to shatter the sturdy strength of the German Csesarship. England
and Normandy were powerful under the policy of the Conqueror, and
the French kings were not strong enough as yet to initiate that
system of aggression which has created modern France. The
popular fervour seconded the politic designs of the princes : the cir-
cumstances of the Holy City, which had for a moment been rescued
from the Turks by its old tyrants the Fatimite Caliphs, were excep-
tionally favourable ; and the careful wisdom and chivalrous prowess
of Godfrey of Bouillon guided the warriors of the first Crusade to
their goal. Jerusalem once more became Christian, and the
reproach of four centuries was wiped away.

Unfortunately, Godfrey did not live to consolidate the state that
he had founded, and his successors, although brave and accomplished
warriors, were quite incompetent to fill a place that required its
occupants to be heirs of his statesmanship even more than of his
prowess. Circumstances were so far favourable that for half the
term of its allotted life no Saracen leader appeared strong enough,
or sufficiently supported by the tribes of the East, to demolish the
fabric that was being erected by the Frank powers, as quickly as it
was raised. Although the impulse of the first Crusade was
sufficient to maintain the little colony so long, it was not free from
the natural process of relaxation ; and the very forces from which it
resulted contained the elements of disruption. But the actual fall
of the Frank kingdom is chiefly to be attributed to the evils inherent
in an attempt to colonise Palestine on feudal principles, although
the determination of the time of its fall was due to the cessation of
those divisions among the Mahometan nations which had rendered its
existence possible. It is necessary for the understanding of the book
before us to go briefly into detail as to these internal defects, which
reached their climax of injurious operation in the history here recorded.

The conquest of Palestine did not immediately result from the
capture of Jerusalem ; it had to be occupied city by city, and when
so occupied to be kept in order by the erection throughout its
extent of a system of strong forts. Under ordinary circumstances
and in the face of a united resistance, such a tenure would have

828 MEMORIALS OF THE RKKJN OF RICHARD J.

been impossible. How wonderful it was that tbe kingdom lasted so
long as it did appears from the way in which the whole fabric,
raised with such pains, fell before Saladin after the battle of Hittin.
One victory then decided the fate of the colony, but it was almost
the only regular victory which the Saracens gained during the
century. They could occasionally by overpowering numbers or by
surprise humble and disperse the Frank armies ; but it almost seems
that a consciousness of their inability to fight a pitched battle with
any chance of victory was, as much as their disunited and dis-
organised condition, the reason why they preferred an inch by inch
defence of their strongholds.

At the time of Godfrey's death (July 18, 1100) very little besides
the city of Jerusalem and the communications with the coast and
the Imperial dominions were in the hands of the Franks. The
principality of Antioch was held by Bohemond, and Baldwin was in
possession of Edessa ; the proper defences of Palestine were, how-
ever, in the hands of independent Moslem emirs. The city of
Ramlah had fallen before Godfrey on his way to Jerusalem ; the
Christians of Bethlehem had made common cause with him before
the siege ; but after the capture of the capital, Ascalon, the key of
Syria towards the south, had successfully resisted his arms, and the
city of Arsuf had been made tributary only after three sieges.
Hebron, Tiberias, Naplous (which had been occupied by Tancred), and
Joppa, had been rebuilt and fortified ; and Haipha was being besieged
at the time of Godfrey's death. The limits of his conquests were
thus circumscribed, partly because of his wish to remain as long as
possible on friendly terms with the emirs on the coast, and partly in
consequence of the jealousies of his fellow leaders ; but the great reason
was undoubtedly the insufficiency of the force at his command to
conquer and hold the cities. It was imperatively necessary that
he should be able to maintain himself in the field : the acquisition
of further territories must be left until the news of the conquest had
brought from Europe fresh hosts of crusaders whose zeal for the
cause or for their own interests could be utilised in that direction.
Godfrey died before this took place, and the task fell to his two
immediate successors.

Baldwin I. (1100-1118) availed himself of the help of those
pilgrims whom either commercial enterprise or more exalted motives
brought to Palestine, to extend the conquest. With the aid of the
Venetians Haipha was taken 1100; in 1101 the fleets of Genoa
and Pisa co-operated in the capture of Arsuf and Ctesarea ; Acre fell
before the Genoese in 1104, Byblus ' and Tripoli in 1109 ; the

1 The city of Byblus or Bihlium, into a lordship for the family of the
Jebeil, which was made by the Genoese Ebriaci, must not be confounded with

MEMOKIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

Pisans took Berytus in 1110, and Sidon was captured the same year
by the aid of King Sigurd and the Norwegians. Tancred in the mean-
time was seizing the towns of Antioch and Cilicia, Adana, Mamistra,
Tarsus, Laodicea, Atsareb, and Sardana. The conquests of Baldwin
II. were chiefly in the north of Syria ; but his reign was marked by
the capture of Tyre by the forces of the kingdom whilst he himself
was in captivity, in 1124, and by that of Paneas in 1128. Ascalou
did not yield before 1153, when the tide had already turned against
the Crusaders ; Edessa had been taken by Emadeddin Zenghi in
the year 1143, which, as it was in point of time the central year of
the Christian occupation, marks also the moment at which their
good fortune began to decline.

During this period of progress the defence of the country had
been secured by the erection of fortresses at Scandalion ! and Toron,2
in the north of the kingdom, and at Montreal 3 in the south, under
Baldwin I. ; and at Beit-Nuba,4 Beit-Gebrin,5 Kerak,6 Ibelin,7 and
Tel-es-safieh 8 under Fulk. The military orders had several other
strongholds, of the precise date of whose erection we have no record,
especially Merkeb 9 in the north of Syria, Kaukab Io and Latroon ll
belonging to the Hospitallers ; and Safed,12 Merle,13 and the Cave of

Gabala, or Jebleh, in the principality
of Antioch, which is mentioned below,
p. 333. They seem to be the Gabelct
magnum and parvum of Benedict of
Peterborough.

1 Scandalion, Iskandcriina, under
the Ladder of Tyre, was fortified by
Baldwin I. in 1116. W. Tyr. 815;
Fulcher of Chartres, 427.

2 Toron, the ancient and modern
Tibnin, was founded by Hugh of
S. Omer, lord of Tiberias, in 1107,
and soon after became the fief of
Henfrid, father of the Constable. W.
Tyr. 798. It is about 13 miles to the
east of the Ladder of Tyre.

3 Montreal. See below, p. 333, note 7.

4 Beit-Nuba, the fort of which,
Castel Arnald, was founded by the
Patriarch William (1130-1144) in
1132, lies on the direct way from Joppa
to Jerusalem. It was identified by
the Crusaders with Nob. W. Tyr. p.
856.

'•> Beit-Gebrin, or Ibelin of the Hos-
pitallers, anciently Eleutheropolis, was
founded by the patriarch in 1134.
W. Tyrt 865. See in vol. R. S. p. 360,
note 9. Pauli, Codice Diplomatico, i.
18, 46.

" Kerak, see below, p. 333, note 7.

7 Ibelin, anciently Jabneh, now
Ycbiia, 11 miles S.W. of Joppa, was
founded in 1142, and given to Baliun
the old. W. Tyr. 886.

s Tel-es safieh, or Blancheguard,
founded in 1143. W. Tyr. 886.

9 Merkeb, or Margat, was on the
northern frontier of the county of
Tripoli, on the coast. W. Tyr. 738 ;
Ansbert, p. 5. Crach of the Hospi-
tallers, in the same region (W. Tyr.
1017), is now Hesn-al-Akrad. See
Robinson, Later Bibl. Researches, p.
565.

10 Kaukab, called by the Crusaders
Coquet, Coket, Cuschet, and more
commonly Beauvoir or Belvoir, now
Kaukab-el-Hawa, lies among the
mountains, near Jordan, between
Bethshan and Tiberias. W. Tyr.
1027 ; Pauli, Codice Diplomatico Ac.,
i. 4, 7, 32; Bohadin, pp. 76, 88;
Fulch. Chart. 381; Cartulary of the
Holy Sepulchre, ed. Roziere, pp. 226,
228.

11 Latroon, see in vol. R. S. p. :>68,
note 1.

12 Safed, 7 miles N.W. of the sea of
Galilee. W. Tyr. 1027; Ansbert, p. 6.

1:1 Merle, see in vol. R. S. p. 255. Not
far from Merle was the Castle of Pil-

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

the Temple ' to the Templars. That which had hitherto been a
matter of precaution became now a necessity ; Gaza * was restored b\
Baldwin III., Darum 3 on the Egyptian frontier by Amalric, and
Castel-neuf 4 and Jacob's Ford under Baldwin IV. The lord of Sidon
also had built himself a fortress at Belfort,5 and the lord of Ibelin at
Mirabel.6

From the year 1164, in which Paneas fell for the third timt-
into the hands of Noureddin, the Christian power quickly waned.
The brilliant victories of Amalric and Baldwin the leper, the astute-
ness of Reginald of Chatillon, the veteran wisdom of Henfrid th«
constable, the devoted valour of the military orders, staved off for
a time but could not hinder the inevitable end. Europe had proved

grims, also belonging to the Temple,
now Athlit. Ben. Peterb. ii. 488 ; As-
sizes, i. 420.

1 Cava or Spelunca Templariorum
lay beyond Jordan, on the confines of
Arabia. W. Tyr. 962. Bohadin, p.
32, calls it Acapha in the desert.

- Gaza was fortified in 1152 and
given to the Templars. W. Tyr. 917.

1 Darum, see in vol. R. S. p. 318.

4 Castel-neuf, or Nigra Guarda
(perhaps Kulat-Hunin, near Paneas),
was built by the Constable Henfrid
shortly before his death. W. Tyr.
942, 1014.

* Belfort now Shakif-Arnun, 8
miles N.W. of Paneas ; belonged to the
lord of Sidon. Assizes, i. 420; W.
Tyr. 1015 ; in vol. R. S. p. 63 ; Bohadin,
p. 89, &c.

• Mirabel (cf. W. Tyr. 918, 1009 ; in
vol. R. 8. pp. 307, 324, below ; Pauli, Co-
dice Dipl. i. 236; Bohadin, pp. 187, 228;
Ansbert, p. 4 ; Cartulary of the Holy
Sepulchre, p. 132) was identified by
Wilken in his ' Comment, de Bell.
Crucial.' with the Masjdeljaba of Boha-
din, from a comparison of the mention
of the capture of the two places as
given in Abulfeda, Excerpta, p. 41,
and in the Chron. Terras Sanctse,
p. 55<J ; but as the circumstances are
so discrepant, he does not seem to
have approved on afterthoughts of
the conjecture. It is impossible, how-
ever, to find another place that answers
as well. It would seem from a grant
of Balian I. to the Hospitallers that
Mirabel was north of Ramlah and
Il>elin (at least the other places
spfoinwl in the same grant were so,)
and from an exchange between Hugh
of Ibfflin, the Church of the Holv

Sepulchre, and the abbot of 88. Joseph
and Habakkuk, that it was near the
latter monasteries. (See in vol. R. S.
p. 285, note 2 ; Cartulary of the Holy
Sepulchre, ed. Roziere, pp. 132, 133)
Masjdeljaba also is mentioned by
Bohadin, as Mirabel is by our author,
in vol. R. S. p. 324, as not demolished
after the battle of Arsuf.

Besides these there were among
the less famous castles of Palestine,
Faba or la Feve, now El-Fuleh, in the
plain of Esdraelon, held by the Tem-
plars and Hospitallers jointly : Cont.
W. Tyr. p. 598. Caco, or Chaccahu,
now Kakoun, 11 miles S.E. of Caesarea.
a castle of the Templars: Cont. W.
Tyr. 598: W. Tyr. 828. Calenzun,
now Kalansaweh, 4 miles S. of
Kakoun : Pauli, Codice Diplomatico,
i. 32. Caimount, or Laqueimont,
Kaimoun; Cont W. Tyr. 640: Assizes,
i. 420, Galatia, Kuratiyeh (see in vol.
R. 8. p. 384). Rouges Cistern, in the
wilderness of Adummim, now Ed-dem,
between Jerusalem and Jericho. Le
Quarantayne, in the wilderness of the
Temptation. Ben. Pet. ii. 488.
Cartulary of the Sepulchre, pp. 222,
235. Castrum Beroardi, near Azotus :
cf. Albert of Aix, 349, and Marino
Sanuto, 87. In the north were
Caphar Mundel, a little N. of Naza-
reth ; Montfort near Kerain, 7 miles
E. of Achzib ; Cavea de Tyrum, now
Mngliara, 10 miles due E. of Sidon.
Cf. W. Tyr. 962 ; Ansbert, p. 4.

The list of the castles of the Holy
Land is given by Benedict of Peter-
borough, ii. 488, and Hoveden, 362,
V. Assizes of Jerusalem (ed. Beugnot),
i. 419, *c.

MEMORIALS OF THE EEIGN OF EICHAED I. 881

itself, by the abortive crusade of 1147, unable to furnish the zeal
and strength required to sustain the fainting colony ; the constant
appeals for help for Jerusalem were unavailing. The great name of
Saladin carried with it the sound of conquest. Still the Christian
state might possibly have survived many years, by sufferance of the
Sultan, had it not been forced by the fatal development of its own
internal sources of decay to the sad catastrophe which was crowned
by the battle of Hittin.

Feudalism l was verging towards decrepitude in Europe when it
was transplanted with all its mechanism into Palestine ; and as the
old system perished in Europe, so almost contemporaneously,
although from widely different causes, the new offshoots languished
and died in Syria. And yet the feudalism of Godfrey was by no
means, as it would have been in the hands of a constitution-monger,
the same system at the same point of growth at which he had left it
at home. It was the system of a century earlier, or perhaps of a
still remoter period. In this respect Godfrey as a lawgiver stands in
an attitude strongly contrasted with that of William the Conqueror,
who had a few years before introduced into England an arrangement
which the kings of France spent a century and a half in trying to
imitate. Each was certainly wise and long-sighted in the course
he took, considering the circumstances in which he had to act.
Godfrey's first and only object was the occupation of a hostile
country ; William's first object was the same, but hardly second to
it was his purpose of rendering impossible in England a relation of
the great feudatories towards their suzerain such as he had known
in France. And the lapse of time and growth of nations justified

1 Lest I should seem to have used the second stage when the kingdom of

this expression wrongly, 1 should say Palestine was founded, and continued

that I understand by feudalism the in it until the reign of Philip Augustus,

feudal system whilst it still retained Godfrey introduced his system in the

life and some sort of energy, before it first stage, which may be considered

was reduced to a mere matter of legal to have lasted until the death of King

rights and payments. In this sense it Fulk. England seems to have arrived

went through four stages before it at the fourth stage, in which the

became extinct:—!. That in which principle of feudalism, that had

the rights and obligations of the great lingered since the invention of scutage,

feudatories were observed. 2. When was almost entirely eliminated, about

the superiority of the suzerain had the time of the confirmation of the

become merely nominal. 3. When the charters by Edward I., a few years

king had succeeded in reducing his after the loss of Acre. In France the

vassals into order and obedience. third stage may be considered to have

4. When the vassals with the church been permanent ; the power, of the

and commons had imposed constitu- king increasing until the theory of

tional (not feudal) obligations on the mutual obligation on which the feudal

king. England never went through bond depended was exchanged for

the first two stages, for feudalism was servility on the one hand, and selfish

introduced in its third stage by William isolation on the other,
the Conqueror. France was still in

882 MEMORIALS OF THE UE1GN OF RICHARD I.

the policy of William, and condemned that of Godfrey. Feudalism
in England was a step towards the development of constitutional
government : in Palestine it was a brilliant pageant, an unsuccessful
experiment in colonisation ; it had neither adequate basis nor
practical result.

The collection of usages known as the Assizes of Jerusalem '
gives us a very perfect picture of a feudal state, but it is no descrip-
tion of any that actually existed. Parts of it may be certainly
looked upon as embodying Godfrey's policy, but the greater portion
of the laws was drawn up at least 180 years after his death. We
trace his hand in the prescribing constant military service 2 (not
definite or merely for a certain period of each year), in the non-
recognition of representation 3 in inheritance, in the rules designed
to prevent the accumulation of fiefs in a single hand,4 in the
stringent regulations for the marriages of widows and heiresses.5
These features all belonged to an earlier age, to a time when every
knight represented a knight's fee, and when no fee could be suffered
to neglect its duty ; when the maintenance of the conquered country
was deemed more important than the inheritances of minors or the
will of widows and heiresses. That these provisions were wise is
amply proved by the fact that it was in these very points that the
hazard of the Frank kingdom lay ; to say that they were not enough
to remedy the evils they were aimed at is but to state a truism — no
legislation can counteract old age or death. Other portions of the
Assizes are to be ascribed to the necessities of the state of things
that followed the recovery of Palestine by the Saracens ; such,
for instance, as the decision how far deforcement by the Turks
defeats seisin ; 6 and were of importance only in the event of a
reconquest. It was in the kingdom of Cyprus and the conquests of
the Crusade of Villehardouin, or possibly in Palestine during the
short period that followed the visit of the Emperor Frederick II.,
that the system of the Assizes was more generally exhibited.

The kingdom of Jerusalem 7 can hardly be said to have ever
subsisted actually in the integrity in which it is described in the

1 The edition of the Assizes which ' The kingdom of Jerusalem ex-
it have used and quote in this preface tended from Durum on the Egyptian
is that of the Count Beugnot, Paris, frontier to the little river Lycus,
1841, which contains also the Lign- between Byblus and Berytus. The
ages d'Outremer. county of Tripoli from the Lycus to

2 Assizes, preface to vol. i. pp. xix, Merkeb. The Antiochene territory
345, 346. from Merkeb to Tarsus. The county of

1 Assizes, i. pp. 108, 109, 276, 637. Edessa, east of Antioch, reached from

4 Assizes, i. p. 225. the forest of Marith to Maredin in

4 Assizes, i. 279, 264, &o. Mesopotamia. W. Tyr. 908 ; J. de

• Assizes, i. 107. • En quel cas force Vitry, 1068 ; Wilken, ii. 596.
de Turs tolt saisine.'

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

333

Assizes ; for the principality of Edessa had been lopped off before
the royal demesne had been completed by the acquisition of Ascalon.
In its idea, however, it contained four great fiefs ; x the principality
of Jerusalem as Godfrey had held it ; 2 that of Antioch, which was
claimed also by the Byzantine emperor as a fief, but was secured to
the monarchy by Baldwin II. ; 3 the county of Edessa, which having
nominally become part of the kingdom by the accession of two of its
counts successively to the throne, had afterwards been bestowed on
Jocelin of Courtenay by investiture and the gift of a standard ; 4 and
that of Tripoli, which was from the conquest dependent on the
kingdom.

The principality of Jerusalem contained four principal baronies,5
the county of Joppa and Ascalon, the principalities of Galilee 6 and
Hebron,7 and the lordship of Sidon and Cassarea.8 In the royal
demesne were included among other places Tyre, Naplous, and Acre ;
and from the time of Fulk and Baldwin III. the county of Joppa
and Ascalon was the appanage of the member of the royal house who
was nearest to the succession : the position, however, of the great
house of Ibelin, who were lords of Ramlah, Mirabel, and Ibelin,9 and

1 Assizes, i. 417, 418.

2 Godfrey did homage to the
patriarch : W. Tyr. 771.

3 The patriarch also claimed fealty
from the prince : W. Tyr. 864. The
patriarch of Jerusalem invested Bohe-
mond with Antioch, and Godfrey with
Jerusalem at the same time. W. Tyr.
771.

4 W. Tyr. 817. The same author,
p. 871, speaks of Edessa as a fief of
Antioch.

5 Assizes, i. 417,418.

6 The principality of Galilee, having
been held by Tancred, Hugh of
Falkenberg, castellan of S. Omer
(1101-1107), Jocelin of Courtenay
(1113-1118), William de Bures the
Constable (1118-1130), returned ap-
parently to the family of Falkenberg
in the time of Baldwin III. (W. Tyr.
921), and came by marriage to the
Ibelin family in the 13th century ;
Tjignages d'Outremcr, Assizes, ii. 455.
Hugh of Tiberias, mentioned p. 23,
was son of Walter of Falkenberg by
Eschiva, who afterwards married Ray-
mond of Tripoli : W. Tyr. 998.

7 The principality of Hebron or
S. Abraham, given first to Gerard of
Champ d'Avesnes, then successively to
Rorgius of Haipha, Walter Mahomet,
and Hugh of Rebecq, was a fief of no
great importance until it was joined

with the lordship of the country on the
other side of Jordan which contained
Kerak and Montreal. This lordship
passed first through the hands of Ro-
manus andRalph du Puy (W. Tyr. 884).
Having been forfeited by the latter, it
was given in exchange for Naplous, to
Payn the butler of the kingdom,
brother to Guy de Milli, and uncle of
Philip of Naplous. Philip of Naplous,
who ultimately succeeded (W. Tyr.
1039), left a daughter Stephanie, who
married first Henfrid II. of Toron,
then Miles of Plancy, and last Reginald
of Chatillon. Lign. d'Out. 452;
Albert. Aquens. pp. 293, 329, 342,
352, &c.

8 The lords of Sidon and Caesarea
descended from Eustace Grenier, the
Constable, d. 1123. Reginald lord of
Sidon mentioned in vol. R. S. pp. 121
and 445, was his grandson, the son of
Gei'ard. Csesarea was held as a fief of
Sidon by a branch of the same family.
Lignages d'Outr. 455. There are
some verses in Martene and Durand,
Ampl. Coll. v. 540, which claim Hugh
of Rebecq, Hugh of Falkenberg,
Eustace Grenier, and ' Harbel of
Rames,' all as natives of the diocese
of Terouanne.

9 The origin of the house of Ibelin is
obscure. According to the Lignages,
which were probably drawn up by

884 MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

subsequently engrossed nearly all the fiefs of Jerusalem and Cyprus,
intrenched very materially on the power of the counts of Joppa. To
the prince of Galilee belonged Tiberias and the north-east ; (he lord
of Sidon had the coast from Sidon to Arstif, with the strongholds of
Belfort and Bethshan ; the prince of Hebron or 8. Abraham held the
south, with the exception of the territory of Ascalon, on both sides
of Jordan, including the impregnable fortresses of Montreal and
Kerak. These four baronies contained in their turn inferior fiefs, of
which the most important were, in the county of Joppa, those of
the house of Ibelin ; in the lordship of Sidon, those of Caesarea,
Arsuf, and Haipha ; L in Galilee, those of the house of Toron,
Paneas, and Castel-neuf. In all these lordships there were high
courts of justice, and in thirty-seven towns of the Holy Land were
as many courts of bourgeoisie, presided over by viscounts,2 who were
often hereditary fief-holders and related by blood to the greater
barons.3 Side by side with this elaborate system, and partially
incorporated with it, was the administration of the fortresses
intrusted to the military orders and of the ports belonging to the
Italian republics : there were also different tribunals for the Syrian
Christians.4

This organisation, which might in favourable circumstances
have been a sufficient defence to the throne of Jerusalem, and
at least would have formed the nucleus of a strong occupying
force, the body of which would have been furnished by the succes-
sions of warlike pilgrims, was, on the contrary, a fatal source of

a member of the family, ' Balian obscurity ; for Hugh <le Puiset,

le Francois fu frere au conte Guilin de bishop of Durham, was nephew to

Chartres, et vint deca mer soi dizieme King Stephen, and his mother must

de chevaliers, et le roi Fouques avoit have stood to Stephen of Blois in

ferme Ibelin, si li dona et Mirabel.' the same relation that Balian did if

He married Helvis, the heiress of the Lignage is correct. The family

Ramlah, and had three sons, Baldwin of Puiset were early in the Holy Land ;

of Barnes or Ramlah, Hugh of Ibelin, two of them were successively counts

and Balian II. Of these, Hugh married of Joppa, and one, Stephen, who had

Agnes of Edessa, and Balian, Mary of himself been viscount of Chartres,

Byzantium, the wives of King Amalric. became patriarch of Jerusalem (W.

The difficulty is about Balian I. Tyr. 848). The town of Ramlah was

William count of Chartres was the given by Baldwin I. to Baldwin of

eldest and disinherited son of Stephen Ramlah, the father of Helvis, Balian's

of Blois and Adela, daughter of William wife. Cf. Lignagcs d'Outreitier, p.

the Conqueror. But Adela certainly 448, Ac. Gesta Dei, &c. i. pp. 685,

had no son named Balian ; possibly 699, 714, 860, Ac.

he may have been an illegitimate son ' Payn of Haipha, mentioned in vol.

of Stephen. He makes his appearance R. 8. pp. 121, 199, seems to have been an

in the Holy Land as constable of inveterate enemy of Guy of Lusignan.

Joppa, having been appointed by Hugh * Assizes, i. 419.

de Puiset count of Joppa, and viscount ' Thus at least were the viscounts of

of Chartres. Strangely, the connexion Naplous. Pauli, Codice Dipl. i. 61, 64.

between the family of Puiset and the ' Called ' Corts de la Fonde.' As-

counts of Blois is in the same sizes, ii. 171.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD J. J)35

decay. The feudal principle was not strong enough to hold it
together. The families of Antioch, Edessa, and Tripoli were
younger branches of -great European houses, who, having found a
splendid provision in the East, were inclined, like the great feuda-
tories in France, to look forward to an independence for themselves,
instead of taking their places as constituent parts of a noble but
most hazardously situated colony : they held themselves competent
to wage war on their own behalf, and to treat for peace and alliance
with sovereign princes, even such as were at war with their suzerain.
In the same way the great barons of the principality, as in France,
were eager to increase their domains, and aspired to the position of
the great feudatories with whom they were closely connected by
marriage. Jerusalem was to all of them only a secondary considera-
tion ; the zeal that set Europe from time to time in a blaze found
no answer in the land for which so much was being sacrificed. The
fresh hordes of Crusaders who disembarked, full of energy and
ambitious of victory, were drawn off by their settled countrymen for
their own separate purposes ; and the force that should have secured
Egypt and Damascus was wasted on unconnected enterprises.

The process of decay and dissolution was hastened by local and
incidental circumstances. The original settlers did not live long in
their new possessions, and their children born in the land were
a degenerate race. There were eleven kings x of Jerusalem in the
twelfth century : under the first four, who were all of European
birth, the state was acquired and strengthened ; under the second
four, who were born in Palestine, the effects of the climate and the
infection of Oriental habits were sadly apparent ; of these four three
were minors at the time of their accession, and one was a leper.
The noble houses which were not recruited, as the royal family was,
with fresh members from Europe, fell more early into weakness and
corruption. The general character of the native Franks united the
faults of their European ancestry with those of the nations among
whom they lived. Personally brave, for the heritage of Godfrey and
Bohemond was not to be forfeited in a single generation, they were
at once ferocious and effeminate, violent and faithless, luxurious and
avaricious ; far more likely, therefore, by their example to betray the

1 Godfrey, 1099-1100 ; Baldwin I., of England, four kings of France, six

1100-1118; Baldwin II., 1118-1131; emperors, and sixteen popes. The

Fulk, 1131-1142 (W. Tyr. 888 ; 1143, life of Fulk of Anjou curiously joins

Wilken, Gesch. d. Kreuzz'Uge, ii. 717 ; the pedigrees of the kings of England

1144, Beugnot, Assizes, i. 428) ; Bald- and Jerusalem. The princess Isabel

win III., 1143-1162 ; Amalric, 1162- or Elizabeth, whose four marriages

1173 ; Baldwin IV., 1173-1185 ; Bald- are the key to the history of the later

win V., 1185-1186 ; Guy, 1186-1192 ; Crusades, stood in exactly the same

Conrad, 1192 ; Henry, 1192-1197. In relation to Fulk as our King Henry II.

the same period there were four kings did.

SIM MEMORIAL OF THE RE1ON OF RICHARD I.

new pilgrims into dishonour and degradation than to lead them
to victory, or to direct their fresh energies into channels in
which their own experience should have taught them that the
course of Western empire, if it were ever to be a reality, must be
made to run.

The moral degradation of the Franks need not have entailed de-
struction from enemies not less degraded ; and their inferiority
in numbers would have been more than compensated by the
successions of pilgrims, which, although they came but for a
time and special purpose, were constant ; and every one of which
might have signalised its visit by some great exploit of conquest, if
there had been a strong policy or any fixed principles of adminis-
tration to guide it. But the shortness and precariousness of life was
an evil without remedy, and in its effects irreparable. Of these the
most noticeable was perhaps one which would have arisen under any
system — the difficulty of carrying on a fixed policy whilst the
administrators were perpetually changing ; but scarcely second to
this was the influence in successions which was thrown into the
hands of women. The European women were less exposed than the
men to the injurious climate, or to the fatigues of military service ;
and many of them, having been born in Palestine, were in a measure
acclimatised. The feudal rights and burdens of heiress-ship,
marriage, and dower were strictly observed ; consequently most of
the heiresses lived to have two or three husbands and two or three
families. To prove this in detail would involve the recapitulation of
all the Lignages d'Outremer. The principality of Antioch was in
wardship from 1111 to 1126, and from 1180 to 1186. From 1186
to 1163, or later, it was held by Constance and her two successive
husbands. During the regency of Roger of Apulia the chance of
gaining Aleppo was lost ; and the folly or vice of Raymond of
Poictiers was the ruin of the second Crusade. In the kingdom
itself, out of eleven descents in the century, only two were from
father to son, and both of these were under questionable circum-
stances. The principality of Galilee, having come by marriage to
William de Bures, was carried by Eschiva to two or three successive
husbands. That of Hebron in the same way passed to the three
husbands of Stephanie. The lordship of Sidon alone descended
directly in the male line.1 The fiefs were all heritable by females ;
the widows of the lords had half their husbands' lands in dower, and
the other half in bailliage or guardianship for their children.* The

1 For similar examples in the sequel Trebizond, by Mr. Finlay, and the

of the Crusade of Villehardouin, the genealogical details in his appendix,
conquest of Romania, *c.. refer to the * Assizes, i. 261-267, 280, 281, Ac.

History of Medvcrval Greece and If the ward was a sovereign prince or

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 337

result of all this was that the great estates were for the greater part
of the century vested either in women or in minors ; and the ad-
ministration of them, and the political influence attached to their
possession, fell into the hands of men who had at the best but a
terminable or short life-interest in them, and were either adventurers,
or, if possessed of a stake in the country, likely to sacrifice their
terminable estates to their nearest interests. Palestine was, more-
over, thus overrun with a race of nobles closely connected by the
half-blood, and with all the family likenesses and jealousies that such
a connexion engenders.1

Still, among the adventurers and fortune-hunters of the Crusades
there were some who sustained by their prowess the fabric that had
in itself no trustworthy principle of cohesion. Such were Henfrid
of Toron,2 the chivalrous constable of Jerusalem, from whose hand
Saladin received the girdle of knighthood, and who was the prop of
the kingdom for six-and- thirty years ; and Reginald of Chatillon,
the fox of Antioch, who, having been for many years a great support
of the state by strength and craft, precipitated by one act of perfidy
the ruin in which he himself so signally perished. The history of
Reginald illustrates what has been said above of the tendency of
circumstances to throw supreme power into the hands of irrespon-
sible men.

Reginald, although the son of a great French noble, Henry, lord

suzerain, the guardians of his person Raymond of Poictiers and Reginald
and lands were chosen by the court of of Chatillon. Queen Sibylla was
his vassals, p. 261. Only a father or three times promised or given in mar-
mother could have ' bailliage enterin,' riage, and her half-sister four times,
that is of both person and fief; in Agnes of Ed essa, mother of Baldwin
other cases the nearest relation to IV., was three times married,
whom the fief might descend had - There were four Henfrids of
charge of the fief, and the nearest Toron : the second, called Henfrid I.
relation to whom it could not descend (see below, p. 9) was constable from
had charge of the person of the ward. 1147 to 1179 ; his son Henfrid II. was
These usages were exemplified in the the'first husband of Stephanie of Kerak
case of Baldwin IV. and V. Later on and died before his father ; Henfrid
it was ruled that the queen-mother III. was the first husband of the
was the lawful guardian of a king in princess Isabel or Elizabeth, who
his minority. Assizes, ii. 397. divorced him to marry Conrad of
1 One famous Matron of the Cru- Montferrat (vol. in R. S. pp. 120, &c.) ;
sades was Madame Estefenie la Henfrid III., although slightingly
Flamengue, who by her first husband, spoken of by our author, was a brave
Gui de Milli, was ancestor of the man, and very useful in the negotia-
princes of Kerak, and by her second, tions between Richard and Saladin.
Baldwin of Ramlah, of the lords of Bohadin (p. 193) describes him as a
Ibelin. Her daughter Helvis was fine young man, with shaven cheeks,
twice married : 1, to Balian of Ibelin ; He had been married to Isabel in
and 2, to Manassier the Constable. 1183, when she was twelve years old, the
Her grand-daughter Stephanie of age for the marriage of heiresses in
Hebron was three times married. Palestine ; and they had lived to-
Constance, princess of Antioch, gave gether until 1191.
that principality to her two husbands,

7.

388 MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

of Chatillon-sur-Marne in Champagne,' came to the Holy Land in
1147, according to William of Tyre, as ' stipendiarius ' or 'gregarius
miles,' probably being too poor to maintain a following of his own.
In 1154 he was chosen by the young widow Constance of Antioch
for her second husband, and in her right exercised supreme power in
Antioch for many years, retaining until his death the title, and
probably some of the privileges, of prince. The vigour and
unscrupulousness with which he exercised his authority drew on him
the peculiar enmity of his Saracen neighbours, whilst among the
Christian nobles he was viewed as an adventurer. Having been
taken captive by Megedin the governor of Aleppo, in 1160, he was
kept in prison for sixteen years, either by the vindictiveness of his
enemies, or, as is more probable, by the lukewarmness of his friends.
In 1175 he was released on payment of an immense ransom, and to
mend his fortunes married Stephanie, princess of Hebron, daughter
of Philip of Naplous, and widow first of Henfrid II. of Toron, and
secondly of Miles of Plancy, the late seneschal of the kingdom.
This marriage placed him in a position even more important, as
regards Palestine, than he had while prince of Antioch ; for
Stephanie's own inheritance was the principality of Hebron, and the
south country on both sides of Jordan, whilst as guardian to her son
by her first husband, Henfrid III., she placed him, after the death of
the constable, in possession of the fiefs of the family of Toron in the
region of Galilee. One of her children was married to the Christian
prince of Armenia, Rupin of the Mountain, and the other to the
princess Isabel of Jerusalem. She was cousin to the lords of Ibelin,
two of whom had married the two wives of king Amalric. In 1177,
as lieutenant of the kingdom under Baldwin the Leper, Reginald won
the famous battle of Ramlah over Saladin ; in 1181 he ravaged
Arabia ; in 1188 he compelled the invincible Sultan to raise the
siege of Kerak. Notwithstanding his great marriage and important
position he was loaded with debt," perhaps contracted for the pay-
ment of his ransom ; and this is said to have been the cause of his
attacking, in 1187, the Egyptian caravan during the truce,3 which
was the ruin of the Holy Land, and drew down upon him the special

1 The authors of the Histoire Lit- Reginald of Muntmirail, who was one

Uraire de la France, xxi. 681, quote a of the heroes of the Crusade of 1200,

MS. of the Chronique d'Outremer in and brother to Hervey of Donzi, lord

which Reginald is described as brother of Oien. Cf . Duchesne, Histoire de la

of the lord of Gien on the Loire, which Ifaison de Cltastillon, p. 70.
would seem to them more probable * Exjxditio Asiatica Imp. Frid. : —

than that a member of the great house Canisius, vol. iii. pt. ii. p. 500.
of Chatillon should be spoken of by * A truce had been concluded with

William of Tyre as a common soldier. Saladin, by Raymond of Tripoli as

But either the authors of the Histoire regent, in 1184, for three years; and

or the writer of the MS. must have at Easter 1187 was renewed for three

confused Reginald of Chatillon with years more by Kin;/ Guy.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 339

vengeance of Saladin. The history of his cruel murder after the
battle of Hittin is told by our author as well as by the Arabic
writers. It is a blot on the fame of Saladin. The conqueror's
hatred of perjury may have been an excuse in the eyes of his
admirers for such an unworthy deed, but we cannot doubt that his
indignation was further inflamed by the recollection of the defeat of
Ramlah, and his own precipitous flight into Egypt.

If the kingdom of Jerusalem had fallen by inheritance, marriage,
or election, to a man gifted with the energy and vitality of Reginald
of Chatillon, the evil day might perhaps have been averted. The
three minorities of Baldwin III., Baldwin IV., and Baldwin V.
hastened the end.

It would have been very difficult under the most favourable
circumstances to devise a law of succession for such a colony as
Palestine, which required from its very nature to have at its head a
man of mature years and statesmanship, with a sound title and definite
authority. It fared ill under a line of sovereigns hardly one of whom
came without opposition to the throne, whose powers were limited by
closest feudal usage, and whose position was rivalled in wealth and
influence by that of their own vassals. Possibly a strong government
might have been secured by making the throne of Jerusalem dependent
on some well-founded European power, such as the empire was under
Frederick Barbarossa. But such a thought seems never to have
entered the heads of the Crusaders ; the succession was left very
much to chance, or to be the prey of the first comer. Had a proper
election been made on Godfrey's death, Tancred would perhaps have
been found his fittest successor ; but whilst the princes were delaying
decided measures, Baldwin of Edessa succeeded as his brother's heir.
No better successor to Baldwin could be found than his cousin Baldwin
de Bourg, who had grown old in the wars of the Holy Land ; nor
could any objection be made to the devolution of the throne to Fulk
of Anjou, his son-in-law. By these expedients (for no principle of
succession was established) a series of four princes of ripe years and
martial experience was obtained, and as long as they lived prosperity
lasted. The attempt to reconcile election with a certain regard for
hereditary succession had been hitherto beneficial. From the death
of Fulk began a series of disputes touching the rights of guardianship
and succession. The first of these was between Milesende and her
son Baldwin the Third. He was a minor at the time of his father's
death, but was recognised as his successor by the nobles. Milesende,
however, as the heiress of the kingdom, had a right to the honours
of queen regnant. Accordingly, mother and son were crowned
together, and during Baldwin's minority it made no difference
whether the queen exercised supreme authority as guardian of the

z2

840 MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

king or as herself the sovereign. As soon as he came of age a quarrel
broke out, the nobles ranged themselves on different sides, and the
schism was only closed by a division of the demesne of the crown :
the evil example, however, was set, and followed at the beginning of
each succeeding reign. Amalric, whose manners were offensive to
some of the great nobles, did not gain recognition as his brother's
heir without some trouble, but no competitor for the crown seems to
have been proposed. His unfortunate marriages produced another
crisis. By his first wife, Agnes of Edessa, he had Baldwin IV. and
Sibylla ; having divorced her on grounds of consanguinity, he
married Mary of Constantinople. On his death, Baldwin was hailed
as his successor, ' consonante omnium desiderio.' But Baldwin was
a minor ; if he was not illegitimate, still his mother was not under
the circumstances a fit guardian for him. Miles of Plancy, the
seneschal of the kingdom, to whom Baldwin seems to have been
intrusted by his father, was a French adventurer, and disliked by
the nobles. The regency was therefore claimed by Raymond of
Tripoli. This was granted by the nobles, but it was another case of
compromise. The law of the kingdom was that if the sovereign was
a minor his guardian should be appointed by his vassals ; their choice
was quite free. But the usage amongst the vassals themselves was
that the wardship of the person of the minor should belong to the
nearest relation incapable of inheriting, whilst the guardianship of
the fief should belong to the next heir ; in case, however, of one of
the parents being alive, he or she had a right to the ' bailliage
enterin ' — of both person and fief. Raymond, in claiming the
wardship, set aside altogether the rights of the mother, and alleged
himself as the nearest relation on both sides, a connexion which
would by itself cancel his legal claims. He was, however, chosen by
the vassals, and filled the place not only during the minority but
during several occasions of Baldwin's illness. This unhappy prince
could not escape the conviction that his death would be a signal for
the disruption of the kingdom. If Raymond were suffered to engross
the supreme power during his life, the rights of his sisters Sibylla
and Isabel would be defeated. He therefore married Sibylla to
William Longaspata, marquis of Montferrat, and intrusted his
brother-in-law with the administration of the kingdom. William
unhappily died very soon after his marriage, and a successor was
sought for Sibylla's hand. After an ineffectual negotiation with the
duke of Burgundy, she married Guy of Lusignan, who very soon
encountered such determined hatred from the native nobles that
Baldwin deposed him from the regency,1 and is said to have con-

1 Raymond was especially hated by Edessa, the king's uncle, and Gerard
the Patriarch Heraclius, Jocelin of of Bideford, the Grand Master of the

MEMOEIALS OF THE KEIGN OF RICHAKD 1. 841

templated a divorce. Before this was effected he died, and Baldwin V.,
the son of Sibylla and the marquis, succeeded by his will. Again
Eaymond of Tripoli claimed the regency, this time by nomination of
Baldwin IV. ; and Jocelin of Edessa was admitted as guardian of
the person of the king. The death of Baldwin V. put an end to the
legal power of Eaymond, but he seems to have hoped to be chosen
king. But the old compromise was adhered to ; Eaymond had made
bitter enemies ; Sibylla was chosen to succeed her son, and imme-
diately bestowed the crown on her husband. The result of her
choice was the loss of the Holy Land. The two children of Sibylla
and Guy died with their mother at the siege of Acre, and the heiress-
ship devolved on Isabel or Elizabeth, daughter of King Amalric by
his second wife, Mary of Byzantium, who had been married to
Henfrid III. of Toron and Hebron, and was divorced from him by
the intrigues of Conrad of Montferrat, to whom she gave her hand.
It is needless to follow further the details of the pedigree. Isabel
was four times married, and thrice conferred the title of king on her
husbands. The last of them was Amalric of Lusignan, king of
Cyprus, brother of Guy, in whose line the titular crown of Jerusalem
subsisted until it came to the dukes of Savoy.1

The line of succession here exhibited was doubtless a mere series
of expedients meant to remedy the defects of hereditary succession
by a sort of election. Intended to secure the benefits of both
methods, it incurred the dangers incidental to both, the weakness of
hereditary right, and the jealousies of the elective system. The
crown was inheritable by females, but the husband of the queen
had to be elected by the states ; a minor might succeed, but the
regency must be provided for by a special act. When Sibylla be-
stowed the crown on her husband, she acted as a true wife, and her

Temple. It was probably at this June- dukes of Savoy, now (1864) represented

ture that Heraclius and the Grand by the emperor of the French. By her

Master of the Hospital were sent to fourth husband, Amalric of Cyprus,

offer the sovereignty of Palestine to she had two daughters, Sibylla, wife of

Henry II. Leo king of Armenia, and Milesende,

1 Isabel had no children by Henfrid. wife of Bohemond IV. of Antioch.

By Conrad of Montferrat she had Mary, the daughter of Milesende and

Mary, wife of John of Brienne, king of Bohemond, sold her rights to the

Jerusalem, by whom she had Yolande, kingdom of Jerusalem to Charles of

wife of Frederick II., through whom Anjou, king of Sicily. The title de-

the crown descended to Conrad and scended with the kingdom of Sicily to

Conradin. By Henry of Champagne, the Angevin kings, and also to those

Isabel had three daughters, of whom of the house of Aragon. In right of

Mary died young; Alice married the latter the title is (1864) borne by the

Hugh I. of Lusignan, king of Cyprus ; king of Ix'aples, the queen of Spain,

and Philippina married Erard of and the emperor of Austria, the last

Brienne. From the second of these of whom has also the rights of the

the title descended to the kings of house of Lorraine to the inheritance

Cyprus, and through them to the of the Angevin kings.

842 MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

choice under ordinary circumstances might have been a wise one.
But she must have known the prejudice against him which
existed in the country, and ought either to have renounced the suc-
cession or to have accepted the responsibility of making a fresh
choice. The nobles of Palestine would not submit to a French
adventurer ; the coronation of Guy practically sealed the fate of the
colony. The choice immediately alienated the count of Tripoli, who,
besides his own great fief, held, in consequence of his marriage with
Eschiva, the widow of Walter of Tiberias, supreme influence in the
principality of Galilee. The great house of Ibelin was also offended.
Baldwin of Rames refused to do homage to Guy, and renounced his
estates in preference. Balian of Ibelin, his brother, who had married
Amalric's queen Mary, and was with her guardian of the legiti-
mate heiress Isabel, took a prospective view of the power he would
have if she were on the throne. Reginald of Sidon was closely
connected with the same family, having married after the death
of Sibylla's mother, Agnes of Edessa, Helvis, daughter of
Balian of Ibelin by Queen Mary. Henfrid of Hebron, however,
probably acting under the influence of his stepfather, sacrificed his
own interest as Isabel's husband to the feeling of loyalty. Guy and
Sibylla were thus little more than titular sovereigns ; the great fiefs
and baronies were, with one exception, opposed to them by interest
and ambition ; the best part of their own county of Joppa and
Ascalon was in the hands of the house of Ibelin ; and the royal
demesne was impaired by the settlement of Naplous as the dowry of
Queen Mary, and thus made available for the aggrandisement of the
same family. The land which had been won by the labour and
blood of all Europe was become the property of a close corporation
of native-born Franks, who would be contented rather to serve Saladin
than to be shorn of their power by European supremacy. Within a
year of the coronation of Guy, the battles of Nazareth and Hittin
were lost, the former because Balian of Ibelin stayed on his way to
hear mass,1 the latter by reason of the treachery or irresolution of
count Raymond. Guy, with the True Cross, fell into Saladin's hands.
During his captivity Balian and Reginald of Sidon surrendered
Jerusalem. All the strongholds had fallen before the capture of the
city, or were taken shortly after, except Ascalon, which was given up
by Sibylla for her husband's ransom, Tyre, which was relieved by
Conrad of Montferrat, and two or three mountain fortresses which
were compelled to surrender in 1189, shortly before the opening of
the siege of Acre.

1 Cont. W. Tyr. p. 599. ' Quant il jusque qu'il auroit oi niesse. . . . Et

ot errc deux inilles, il vint a une cit£ saches que si Beleen ne fust tome au

qui a noni le Sabat. II se pensa qu'il Sabat, per oir messe, il fat bien venu

estoit beau jor, et qu'il n'iroit avant a point a la bataille.'

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 843

The only sound element in the country was the organisation of
the military orders.1 These procured a constant succession of fresh
and healthy blood from Europe, they were not liable to the evils of
minorities, their selfish interests were bound up with the strength of
the kingdom. If one Grand Master fell, another of equal experi-
ence and dignity took his place ; if estates accumulated in their hands,
they were not applied to the strengthening of faction against faction
or family against family, but for the aggrandisement of the body in
sustaining the welfare of the Holy City and Palestine. It was pro-
bably for this reason, their character as corporations, undying and
free from the evils of old age and infancy, and perhaps from a trust,
not misplaced, in the virtue and honour of the knights, that Henry
II. chose them as the depositories of his treasure devoted to the
purpose of a crusade. It was certainly for the same reason, and not
for any real pretext of faithlessness, that they fell under the especial
vengeance of Saladin. It may be safely said that if Palestine could
have been recovered and maintained by the Western powers it would
have been by the knights of the Temple and the Hospital.2 If their
system had been adopted Palestine might have been still in Christian
hands, or at least have continued so as long as Cyprus. Even the
Venetian system, by which the Levantine states were afterwards
governed, might have insured a longer measure of life ; for it was
secured by the constant infusion of fresh blood, and by the avoid-
ance of the evils of which the history of Palestine was sufficient
warning ; nor did it fall until Venice was too decrepit to support it.

I have already pointed out some of the reasons why the second
Crusade and the constant successions of minor expeditions failed to
secure their object. The pilgrims were drawn in to ally themselves with
the divided interests, and to subserve the petty purposes of the Frank

1 Yet the catastrophe of the king- language of the Cotton MS. is just

dom was due partially to the quarrel what we might expect if Richard

between Raymond of Tripoli and the canon and Richard the prior were

Gerard of Bideford, the Grand Master identical.

of the Temple. This arose from the 2 I do not of course forget the

fact that Raymond had refused Gerard, charges of ambition and faithlessness

before he took his vows, the hand of generally received against the military

the heiress of Botron, in the county orders, on the faith of the Chroniqite

of Tripoli. Hence the Templars had a d'Outremer. It is of the machinery

hand in the elevation of Guy of Lu- of their government that I speak ; such

signan to the throne. Is it possible that charges are always made against

the hostility of Raymond to Gerard bodies of men who will not serve the

and the Templars should throw any private interests of the accusers,

light on the authorship of this book ? Precisely the same charges are brought

The most ancient MS. contains the against the Patriarchs, the Legates,

account of the treachery of Raymond the Syrian Christians, the European

at Hittin, and of the martyrdom of Crusaders, in fact everybody except the

Gerard at Acre. Of these, the former native Frank nobles, who, if facts are

is altogether omitted and the latter to speak, were far the most guilty in

abridged in the later MSS. The the loss of Palestine.

844 MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

settlers. The agency that was so well employed by Baldwin I. in
capturing the fortresses of the coast was diverted and wasted when
the native families had established their separate interests. The
strife between the parties of Guy and Conrad before Acre was the
climax of what had been going on ever since the death of King Fulk.
But there was a further reason, which perhaps is still more fully
exemplified in the history of the crusade of Richard. The hetero-
geneous composition of the crusading armies ; their want of common
or uniform organisation, and the presence with them of immense
crowds of warlike pilgrims ready to serve any master for wages, and
dependent on very precarious means for subsistence at all. Ill pro-
vided and unattached, they were a constant encumbrance, a constant
source of famine and disease.

So long as the princes were followed by their knights, and they by
their own retainers, discipline and united action could be insured, but
even then the allied forces required the guidance either of a general
council of command, or, better still, of one commander. The former plan
was adopted at the siege of Acre with some degree of success, and
the latter during the subsequent campaigns under Richard, but only
in a measure ; the army was still encumbered with an immense
mass of followers, who were generally their own masters. In illus-
stration of this defect, I may refer to the very curious tract in the
appendix to the preface to these memorials (in R. S.) The event it
describes was an episode in the second Crusade, the siege and capture
of Lisbon in 1147, but the same proceedings were repeated with
similar results by several of the other crusading fleets, and especially
on the occasion of the capture of Silvia by the English and Flemish
warriors on their way to Acre.

A kingdom thus divided against itself, under a powerless stranger,
filled with feudal nobles who feared and hated the Christians of
Europe more than the Moslems themselves, might have fallen long
before the battle of Hittin. It may be said indeed to owe not only
its continued existence but even its origin to the divisions between
the Saracens of Egypt and the Turks in Mesopotamia and Syria.
So long as they were kept asunder, the kingdom maintained itself.
But no sooner had Noureddin founded a strong power in Syria than
the decay began. Wars might be alternately waged against Egypt
and Damascus, but the pressure of war was continual. When
Egypt and Damascus were united by Saladin the end was imminent ; l

1 Although it is almost impossible that by report at least he had united

to identify all the names of the allies in his service all the tribes of his

of Saladin as given in the earliest MS. empire. Noureddin the emir of Amiza

of this work, pp. 12 and 13, vol. in R. S., was Noureddin the son of Kara Arslan ;

we may make out sufficient to show his presence in the army is mentioned

MEMORIALS OF TEE EEIGK OF EICHARD I. 345

there was no seeking peace at Damascus to gain time for a war
in Egypt, nor aid in Egypt against an upstart sultan at Damascus.
Saladin had abolished the Fatimite Caliphate, which had rendered
this state of things feasible. The enemy was one, on all sides,
watchful, unwearied ; without a succession of help from Europe,
however often defeated, he must be at last victorious. The Frank
nobles saw themselves perishing for a cause with which they had
little sympathy ; under Saladin they might still be powerful, as
refugees in Europe they could be reduced to the insignificance from
which they sprung. Hence to all the evils of the perishing kingdom
the native Franks added the want of faith in their own cause, and
consequently either actual treachery towards their allies, or a
lukewarmness in support of them that was not less fatal.

The crusade of Eichard was, then, an experiment tried with the
very best intentions to restore and maintain the existence of a state
that possessed but one element of life, and that not a part of its own
organisation, and overborne by the general process of decay. An
indefensible territory, for all the approaches to Palestine were in the
hands of Saladin ; the native population either annihilated, or, where
it existed, in active hostility ; a royal succession dependent on the
caprices of a girl ; the hereditary nobility degenerate and divided,
more attached to their own interests than to their nationality or
their character as Christians, and preferring subjection to a pagan
suzerain to the constant uncertainty and harass of a defensive
organisation ; a vast and unmanageable host of allies, carrying with
them to Palestine all their jealousies, and accunmlating fresh causes

by Bohadin, pp.51, 58, 104; he was of Harem (Abulf. p. 5), who was
accompanied by the emirs of Meso- deposed in 1183 (Abulf. 34), is an
potamia — Eoob, Eakka, Nisibis, Mya- anachronism ; and some of the other
farekin, Edessa, Samosata, Bireh, and names were only picked up by hearsay.
Turbessel. Among the Syrian allies There are some that can be identified
we recognise the emirs of Gibel, Kerak, with Saladin's personal attendants and
Antilibanus, Bozrah or Buseireh, councillors, Bellegeminus, Mestoch,
Aleppo, and Damascus ; among the Baffadinus (either Bohadin or Sapha-
Egyptian those of Damietta, Cairo, and din) of Arka ; Aias de Stoi (Ijaz-et
Alexandria. From Asia Minor the tawil), the emir Carracoensis (Kara-
sultan of Iconium, the lord of Khelat koush) ; dux Dorderinus Hedredinus
(Acalatinus), Bohadin 61, and Shems- Bedreddin Duldurn (vol. inE. S. p. 434).
eddin of the Mountains. The caliph The forms Sanscoits and Sanguinus
of Bagdad and sultan of Iconium are seem both to represent Zenghi. The
not likely to have been present in emir Cassachius is probably the person
person ; the latter, however, was called, by Bohadin, Hassan the son of
closely connected by marriage with Kipjak ; or the emir of the Caffecliaks
Saladin (vol. in E. S. p. 51) ; and the (Chron. Terras Sanctffi, p. 548).
former, under the name of ' Muleina,' Jebedinusis Saladin's uncle Shebeddin
seems to be referred to ibid. p. 230, Mahmoud (Abulfeda, Exc. p. <J) ;
as under the orders of Saladin. The Megedinus, Muhjoddin (Bohadin, 57) ;
' dux Serbeth de Harengo,' if it is Jerafaradinus, Sjerphoddin (Bohadin,
meant for Serchak the governor 50)

846 MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

of strife at every step of their journey ; the impossibility of uniting
in even one effort a sufficient force of different nations ; the division
of the Christian camp into two irreconcilable parties ; the unhealthi-
ness of the country ; the difficulty of communications ; the scarcity
of provisions ; the unwearied aggressions of a most able adversary ;
the certainty that treachery was lurking on every side ; and the dis-
traction of conflicting claims on his time and thoughts, were causes
surely enough to account for any failure on Richard's part to carry
out his hopes of conquest. Yet his expedition, such as it was, and
coming at the moment it did, was the means of prolonging the
existence of the kingdom for another century, and, in its consequences,
of maintaining the social and mercantile communication between
Europe and the Levant throughout the middle ages. Venice and
Genoa, with all that resulted from their colonial system in the
eastern Mediterranean, owed their opportunity and some part of
their prestige to the conquest of Cyprus, and the other exploits of the
pilgrims of the third Crusade.

Although the increasing helplessness of Baldwin IV., and the
imminent prospect of a disputed succession or an unpopular regency,
scarcely aroused the Franks of Palestine to a sense of the danger of
their divided condition, the rapid advance of Saladin in power and
resources warned them unmistakably that, unless they were helped
from the West, their continued existence as a nation would soon
depend on the sufferance of the Saracens. From none of the
princes of Europe had they greater right to expect aid than from
Henry of England. Personally, he was the nearest kinsman of the
royal house, and in right of his wife he was head of the family
to which the prince of Antioch belonged.1 He had been for many
years under a vow of pilgrimage. Very early in his disputes with
Archbishop Thomas he had declared himself anxious to take the
cross. In 1166 he had tried to raise money by placing in all the
English churches an alms-box to receive contributions for Jerusalem.9
When in 1168 he had declared himself ready to go down into Egypt
to the aid of his uncle Amalric,3 the fulfilment of his expressed
intention had been so long delayed that Lewis VII. refused to
believe that he would ever fulfil it. In 1169 the Archbishop
Frederick of Tyre had found in him the only prince of Europe who
•

1 Raymond of Poictiers, father of Philippa being daughter and heiress of

Bohemond HI., the reigning prince, Count William IV.
was brother to Eleanor's father. She * R. de Diceto, 547.

also claimed to be head of the family ' John of Salisbury, ep. 244, c.

of Toulouse, to which the count of ed. Migne.
Tripoli belonged, her grandmother

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

347

held out even a promise. He would, he said, if the pressure of his
difficulties with Becket were removed, start for Jerusalem the next
Easter ; calling his uncle, the king of Jerusalem, to witness that he
had forgiven his enemy.1 He was absolved from the guilt of his
share in Becket's death, in consideration of a vow to go for three
years on a crusade, and to perform his pilgrimage the very next
summer ; he was also to maintain two hundred knights for a whole
year for the defence of Palestine.2 When his vow fell due, it was

1 Job. Salisb. ep. 293.

2 Hoveden, 303 ; Gir. Camb. De
Instr. Prin. 26, 27. It is just pos-
sible that to this vow was remotely
due the establishment of an order of
knights of S. Thomas of Acre, which
was in existence early in the next
century, and which, if the Chronicle of
the Teutonic Order is to be believed,
possessed in 1291 no less than 5,000
soldiers, Chron. Ord. Teut. in Mat-
thseus, Vet. Mvi Analect. x. 182 (ed.
1710) ; Hermann Corner, ap. Eccard,
i. 942.

The origin of the order is also
attributed to William, the chaplain
of Ralph de Diceto. Matthew Paris
(p. 427) asserts that the knights
were originally seculars, but that the
order was remodelled and affiliated to
the Templars, by Peter des Roches,
bishop of Winchester, during
his visit to Palestine from 1227
to 1232. Newcourt (Repertorium, i.
553) quotes from the Theatre of
Honour, Lit. 9, c. 11 : ' The order of
Saint Thomas was instituted by the
king of England, Richard surnamed
Cceur de Lyon, after the surprizal of
Acres, and being of the English nation,
they held the rule of S. Augustine,
wore a white habit, and a full red
cross charged in the middle with a
white scallop.' The house of S.
Thomas of Acre in London was
founded in connexion with this order
by Thomas Fitz Theobald of Helles,
and Agnes his wife, sister of Thomas
Becket, which points to an earlier
origin than the siege of Acre. Cf.
Newcourt, I.e., and Monast. Angl., vi.
646, &c. The Patent Rolls of the
ninth year of John contain a pro-
tection of the messengers of the House
of S. Thomas at Acre, being canons,
who had come to England seeking
alms for the redemption of captives.
Rot. Pat. i. 76 (ed. Hardy), Oct. 13,
1207 It is to be observed that Henry's

200 knights were to be regulated by
the customs of the Templars. The
order of S. Thomas survived the
capture of Acre, and even the ruin of
the Templars. The master of the
hospital of S. Thomas of Acre in
London is called, in 1279, ' frater mili-
tias ' (Reg. Peckham, fo. 158 b). Be-
sides this hospital, the order had pos-
sessions in Wapping, Coulsdon, Step-
ney, Westbury, Hertford, and the
hospital of S. James, at Doncaster.
It had a preceptory in Ireland, founded
by benefactions of Fulk de Villars, in
1219, and Gilbert, earl marshal. I
have not been unable to recover the
names of any of the masters of the
order before the capture of Acre, unless
William de Huntyngfeud, who was
master of the house in London in
1267, was one. In 1279 the master
was in England, and the brethren
begging for their church. After the
capture of Acre, the seat of the master
was at Nicosia, in Cyprus, where he
possessed a church, ' S. Nicolai
Anglicorum.' In 1323 Henry de Bede-
ford, knight and master of the order,
was in England, having made over the
hospital in Nicosia to Brother John de
Parys : the brethren at Nicosia refused
to recognise Henry de Bedeforde as
master, and William de Glastonbury,
the preceptor, was at the head of the
order there. In 1344 Robert de Ken-
dale was the master, with the title
' Totius ordinis militias S. Thomas
Martyris in regno Cypri, Apuliae,
Sicilise, Calabriae, Brundusii, Angliae,
Flandriae, Brabantiae, Scotise, Walliaa,
Hiberniffl, et Cornubise, Ac. &c. gene-
ralis praeceptor.' In 1357 Hugh Cur-
teys was preceptor in Cyprus. In
1379, and after that date, the master-
ship of the order seems to have been
held by the 'master of the hospital
of S. Thomas in London, which gradu-
ally fell into the status of an ordin-
ary Augustinian hospital. See the

848 MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

not renounced, but delayed ; and the delay was purchased by a
promise to found three abbeys, which he fulfilled in a characteristic
way,1 by displacing (in 1177) the canons of Waltham and the nuns
of Amesbury, to make way for establishments of the stricter orders
of Austin canons and nuns of Fontevraud. In the same year he had
agreed with Lewis VII. to take the cross ; in 1181 he had made the
same arrangement with Philip. He had given a further proof of
sincerity in the annual payment of money, which had accumulated
in the coffers of the Templars and Hospitallers, in 1187, to 80,000
marks. Something also might reasonably be expected from the
English and Norman chivalry, who had never since the first Crusade
drawn a sword in the cause of the Sepulchre. The conquest of
Lisbon, the sole fruits of the Crusade of 1147, was indeed accom-
plished, for the most part, by English valour, but it was the work of
the burgher and poorer pilgrims, not of the feudal nobles.

Accordingly, the Patriarch Heraclius, in 1185, betook himself
especially to Henry, demanding of him more than pecuniary
assistance, either the fulfilment of his vow, or the mission of one of
the young princes to take the government of the Holy Land.8 He
went so far as even to recognise him as the heir and lord of Palestine.3
But this bribe had no charms for Henry : any little town in France
would have been more inviting. He called a council at Clerkenwell
to decide for him, and there his coronation oath was alleged as an
excuse for refusing personal aid ; nor would he venture to bind his
sons in their absence. Heraclius, after an angry remonstrance, ended
his mission by applying to the young princes the words that Saint
Bernard had used of their father ; ' From the devil they came : to the

Register of the house, MS. Cotton. arch. In case of the extinction of

Tiberius C.V. Report of Deputy Keeper the family of King Baldwin, much

of Records, vii. 272, 293, Ac. Taxa- might be made to depend on such a

tion of P. Nicolas, 47, 52, etc. title, especially if the possessor was

1 Gir. Can ih. De Instr. Prin. 27. strong enough and rich enough to

2 Peter of Blois declares that he maintain it. But it is also possible
was present, ' ubi regnum Palestine, that Baldwin IV., seeing the danger
regnum etiam Italiae, patri vestro, aut of a female succession, commissioned
uni filioruni suorum, quern ad hoc Heraclius to make the offer. The
eligeret, ab utriusque regni magnatibus MS. Continuation of William of Tyre,
et populis est oblatum.' Ep. cxiii. Reg. 14, c. 10, has this : ' Erat et
ad G. Eboracensem archiepiscopum, specialis causa quare eum in regni
Opp. (ed. Busaeus, Mentz, 1600) p. illius tuitionem vocare disponerent,
204 ; cf. Giraldus Camb. De Instr. quoniam si quid humanitus iis qui
Prin. 59 ; R. de Diceto, 626 ; Hove- erant contingeret haeredibus, ad ipsum
den, 358. vel liberos ejus uni versa devolverentur

* The importance of this point ap- jure agnationis. Erat sane Amaurici

pears greater when it is remembered patruelis, et Fulconis quondam regis

that the kingdom of Jerusalem was nepos.' Lib. i. c. 2. The statement

looked upon as a fief of the Holy of relationship is wrong ; but the

Sepulchre ; that Godfrey himself had error is a common one.
done homage and fealty to the patri-

MEMORIALS OF THE EEIGN OF RICHARD I. 349

devil they will go.' l He returned in despair to Palestine, followed,
however, by a large company of pilgrims, who, finding on their
arrival that Guy had just concluded the truce of Easter 1187,
returned home. Two English knights, Hugh de Beauchamp and
Roger de Mulbrai, remained to share the fortunes of the Franks ;
the former of these was slain and the latter taken captive at the
battle of Hittin.2

The terrible news of the loss of the Holy Cross, the capture of
the king, and the murder of the Templars was brought to Europe
in letters from the chiefs of the Temple and the Hospital, early in
October 1187. Pope Urban III. died of grief at receipt of the tidings,
on the 20th of that month : and in November, perhaps before the
capture of Jerusalem was known, Eichard, count of Poictou, received
the cross from the hands of the archbishop of Tours.3 William of
Tyre, the historian of the kingdom, arrived soon after. The Crusade
was preached in England, France, and Germany. In January 1188
Henry and Philip were reconciled, and took the cross ; in March
Frederick Barbarossa held his great council at Mentz for the same
purpose, and fixed the time for setting out for the March of the
following year. It is impossible to say whether Henry would have
fulfilled his vow ; he went, however, so far as to enter into negotia-
tions with the king of Hungary and the emperor of Constantinople,
for a passage for his forces through their dominions. A fresh quarrel
with Richard, almost immediately after, put a stop to his preparations
and the contest continued until a short time before his death, on the
6th of July, 1189.

Frederick, in pursuance of his vow, marched from Ratisbon in
1189,4 and after proceeding through the Byzantine dominions, beset

1 Giraldus, De Inst. Princ. p. 67. account of the battle of Hittin did not

The story of S. Bernard's prophecy is arrive before October. The loss of

told in Bromton, coll. 1045-6. Jerusalem seems to have been a less

'-' Hoveden, 361 V, 361 r°. shock generally than the capture of

;t The news which induced Richard the True Cross.

to take the cross reached the West ' The writer of this work is an inde-

about the calends of November : Gir. pendent authority on the march of

Camb. De Instr. Princ. p. 98 ; and he Frederick, and agrees so closely with

took it the very morning after he re- the details of Ansbert and the other

ceived the news. Bromton, 1148. He authorities referred to later on,

was the first to take the cross. Itine- that it is clear he received his infor-

rariuin, p. 32. So that he may have mation from eye-witnesses. The

waited until the news of the capture letter of Saladin to Frederick, as given

of Jerusalem arrived. A month was by him in the longer version, is pro-

quite sufficient time for the news to be bably authentic ; the enumeration of

brought from Palestine to France, the the Sultan's titles, in the conclusion,

voyage from Acre to Marseilles occu- agreeing closely with the summary of

pying only 15 days with a fair wind : them given by Bohadin, Vit. Sal. p.

Hoveden, 382 v° ; yet it would seem, 1. ' I essay to write the history of the

from the arrangement of the letters in victorious king, defender of the faith,

the different chronicles, that the subduer of the servants of the cross,

850 MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

at every step with both violence and treachery, perished in the Caly-
cadnus in June 1190. The shattered remnant of his army, under
his son Frederick of Suabia, arrived in the Antiochene territory on
the 21st June, and at Acre in August. The English and French
crusaders, under Philip and Richard, had not at that time left Europe.

Whilst the princes were delaying, the humbler and more inde-
pendent pilgrims were hurrying to Palestine. Geoffrey of Lusignan,
brother of the king, was compelled by a quarrel with Richard to leave
France, and hastened to the East, arriving at Tripoli in the summer
of 1188. The fleet of Londoners, Norsemen, and Frisians left Dart-
mouth in company on the 18th of May the following year, and, having
afforded the king of Portugal material aid in his war with the Moors,
arrived at Acre in September 1189. A strong detachment of French
nobles, including the bishop of Beauvais, Counts Henry of Bar and
Erard of Brienne, James of Avesnes, the hero of the siege of Acre, at
the head of the Flemings, and Lewis, landgrave of Thuringia, with a
company of German pilgrims, started at the same time. These were
followed at a short interval by a mixed company of English, French,
and German knights.1 The counts of Blois and Champagne, with
strong reinforcements, reached Acre in July 1190.2

The main body of the English and French armies was still lagging
behind, with the kings : and did not move from home until a whole
year after Frederick Barbarossa had left Ratisbon. In March 1190
an English, Norman, and Gascon squadron, under Richard de
Camville, Robert de Sabloel, William de Forz of Ol6ron, the archbishop
of Auch, and the bishop of Bayonne, sailed from Dartmouth ; they
reached Marseilles, where they expected to meet Richard, on the 22nd
of August, and not finding him there sailed to Messina, where they
arrived on the 14th of September.3

lifter up of the standard of justice and the father, see pp. 28 and 74, vol. in

equity, health of the world and of R. S., also Theobald of Bar, brother and

religion, Saladin, the sultan of the Mos- successor of Count Henry,

lems and of Islam itself, deliverer of * In this party were, besides the

the holy house of God from the hands count of Blois and his brother Stephen

of idolaters, the servant of the two holy count of Sancerre, Count Ralph of

cities, Abulmodaffer Saladin, the son of Clermont, with his nephew William

Job.' Compare with this p. 40, vol. in the Butler, in Senlis, who was taken

R. 3. The letter of Frederick to Saladin prisoner on the day of Conrad's

is evidently corrupt in its present state, marriage, see p. 122, vol. in R. S.; Guy

in all the versions, so that it is hardly and Lionel of Chatillon, Gobert of

fair to condemn it without more infor- Aspromont, Bernard of S. Valery,

million : judged, however, by the side Clarembald of Noyers, and the Count

of the manifestoes of modern heroes, William of Chalons. Most of the

it contains nothing, primafacie,incon- minor nobles may be identified in the

sistent with authenticity. various heraldic and genealogical

1 In this company were William of memoirs of the French families, or in

Perche-Goeth and Hervey of Gien, Du Cange's notes to Villehardouin.

the sons of Hervey of Donzi, or the * Hoveden, 380 v°, 383 r°.
latter may have been Hervey of Donzi

MEMOEIALS OF THE KEIGN OF KICHAKD I. 351

Kichard, having assembled his forces at Tours, and Philip, having
rendezvoused at Paris, met at Vezelai on the llth of July. Thence
they proceeded to Lyons, where the kings separated, Philip hastening
to Genoa, and Richard to Marseilles. There the English army divided.
Richard and his suite, the chief of whom was the archbishop of Rouen,
left on the 7th of August, coasted along the Italian shore,1 and, after
a leisurely tour, arrived at Messina on the 28rd of September.2 Bald-
win, archbishop of Canterbury, with Hubert Walter and Ranulf
Glanvill proceeded directly to Palestine : they arrived at Tyre on the
16th of September, and at Acre on the 12th of October.3 The third
division, to which the author of the Itinerarium was attached, and
which was to rejoin the king at Messina, left Marseilles on the 16th
of August, and reached the place of meeting a few days later ; being
followed by the fleet, which had sailed round by Portugal.4 Philip,
who had taken advantage of an illness which attacked him at Genoa,
to secure the friendship of the republic, arrived at Messina on Sep-
tember 16th. At Messina the two armies stayed until the spring of
1191, and it was not before June, four years after the battle of Hittin,
and two from the opening of the siege of Acre, that the crusade was
completed by the arrival of Richard at Acre, the first to take the
cross, and the last to fulfil his vow.

The occasion of this delay 5 was said to be the necessity for
providing money and food for so large a force ; and this was
probably the true reason. The delay was an unhappy one, so far as
it touched the reputation of the kings, who had time not only to
waste in unhappy bickerings, but actually to aggravate the animosity,
that was already too strong to be concealed, into deadly hatred. But
in estimating the evil consequences of this waste of time and power
it should be considered that, if it tended to prolong the distress of the
army before Acre, labouring, as it did, under famine and pestilence,
surrounded by enemies, and destroyed by internal corruption, it
saved from a like destruction the hosts of Richard and Philip. The
defenders of Acre were worn out with a siege of two years when they
surrendered, although the force of the besiegers was numerically an
overwhelming one. If mere numbers or skill could have captured
the city, it must have fallen long before Richard came ; and if the

1 He made his appearance off Genoa, as September 23rd the kings intended
with fifteen galleys, on the 13th of to proceed direct to Acre. Archbishop
August. Ottoboni Annales ; Pertz, Baldwin, when he reached Tyre,
xviii. 101. believed that Kichard was following

2 Hoveden, 380. close behind him : and according to
* Letter from Baldwin to the con- Hoveden, 383 v°, Philip sailed for

vent of Canterbury ; MS. Lambeth, Acre the very day that Kichard reached

415, fo. 85. Messina, but was forced to put back

4 See p. 153, vol. in R. S. into port by the weather.

4 It is clear, however, that as late

852 MEMORIALS OF THE REIGX OP RICHARD I.

difficulty of providing food and shelter for the existing army was so
great as it appears, it would have been madness to increase it during
the winter with the hosts of England, Normandy, Poictou, Anjou,
and France.

The object of the third Crusade was nothing less than the
reconquest of the whole kingdom of Jerusalem, and that under the
most unfavourable circumstances. When the first Crusaders under-
took the same task, the country was in an unsettled state, the towns
governed by Emirs, who were practically independent, the Mahometan
powers of Egypt and Syria arrayed in both temporal and spiritual
rivalry against each other, and the sovereignty of Jerusalem itself in
dispute between them. Godfrey found, from the cities he passed on
his march from Antioch to Jerusalem, at least neutrality, from some
even hospitality. He had no difficulty in reaching Jerusalem, and
it soon fell before him. Now, on the contrary, the garrisons of
Saladin, experienced and valiant soldiers, trained to Frank warfare
and clad in Frank armour, occupied all the strongholds from Sidon
to Darum, Tyre only excepted. Saladin was lord of Damascus and
Aleppo and Bagdad, and had abolished the prayer for the Fatimite
Caliph in the mosques of Cairo. The fortresses which it had taken
the Frank kings ninety years to build and fortify were, every one of
them, in the hands of the enemy. The Sultan had followed up the
defeat of Hittin with energy. Within the month of July 1187 he
had taken Tiberias, Acre, Naplous, Haipha, Caesarea, Sepphoris,
Nazareth, Toron, and Sidon. In August he took Byblus and Berytus.1
Saphadin, whom he had summoned from Egypt to meet him at
Masjdeljaba,2 laid waste the plain of Ramlah and the south country,
Darum, Ibelin, Joppa, Ramlah, Mirabel and Arsuf. Ascalon was
surrendered in September, and in consequence Gaza, Beit-Gebrin, and
Latroon yielded without a blow. The Holy City was taken in
October. Early the next year the few remaining fortresses were
besieged, Kaukab or Belvoir, the stronghold of the Hospitallers,
Kerak, Shobek, Belfort, and Safed. Whilst they were holding out,
the victprious Sultan overran the territory of Antioch and Tripoli.
He took in succession Laodicea, Jebleh, Sehjoun, Bacasus, Burzia,
Derbasac,3 and reduced the prince of Antioch to promise that he
would surrender that city, the firstfruits of the first Crusade, if it
were not succoured within seven months. Safed and Kerak were
taken in November 1188,4 Kaukab in January 1189/' and Shobek in

1 Tiberias, July 5 ; Acre, July 9 ; Chronieon Terne Sanctne. Cf. Hove-

Toron, July 20 Sidon. July 27 ; Eery- den, 362 v«.
ttis, July 30-Aug. 6 ; all the rest before - Abulfeda, 41.

September?; Bohadin, 73. Abulfeda, * Ansbert, 5.

Excerpta, 41, gives the captures in ' Bohadin, 88.

slightly different order, as does the * Bohadin. 83.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD J. 853

the following May.1 Against all this was to be set only Tyre, which
was relieved by Conrad of Montferrat in July, and had successfully
held out against Saladin in the winter of 1187. Tripoli had been
saved by Margarit, the admiral of William of Sicily, who had also
destroyed the fortifications of Byblus and Joppa in a descent upon
the coast.2 Hervey of Donzi, in the principality of Antioch, was at
the head of a small but well-trained army.3 Merkeb and Hesn-al-
•akrad were still held by the Hospitallers4, Reginald of Sidon
maintained Belfort against Saladin ; and Hugh of Tiberius,5 in a
hasty raid, had destroyed the garrison and defences of Arsuf . Belfort
held out until April 1190.6

When King Guy, with his 700 knights and 9,000 serving-men,
encamped before Acre, Tyre and Belfort were the only towns in the
territory of Jerusalem that were held by the Christians. Richard
and Philip had not begun their preparations. Frederick Barbarossa,
far off in Macedonia, was struggling against the savage auxiliaries of
the Byzantine empire. There was division in the remnant that
remained in the country. The marquis had refused to allow the
king to enter Tyre. The Genoese had attached themselves to the
former, and the Pisans to the latter ; and the quickly-arriving
companies of pilgrims attached themselves, according to their
national alliances, to the one or the other. What Guy proposed,
Conrad objected to ; the count of Tripoli was dead ; the prince of
Antioch a helpless neutral. It was an act of no small faith and
energy in King Guy, with so small a force and so few powerful
European connexions, to undertake a task which proved too great
for all the chivalry of Christendom. ' The king, the Templars, the
Hospitallers, the archbishop of Pisa and the Pisans, against the will
of the marquis and of the archbishop of Ravenna, came down
against Acre to besiege it, four days before the end of August
1189.' 7

It does not appear why Conrad opposed this measure ; perhaps it
was only because he himself was not placed in command. It was a
matter of necessity that Acre should be recovered before anything
else was attempted ; for it was the only safe harbour on the coast of
Palestine, except Tyre ; and its position was such as to enable its
holders to open or close, at will, the communications between Tyre
and Jerusalem.

There were three possible ways of proceeding to the conquest :

1 Bobadin, 90. Canisius, iii. pt. ii. p. 502.

- R. de Diceto, 641. l! It was closely besieged from April

2 See Roger Niger, ed. Anstruther, 21, 1189, to April 22, 1190. Bohadin,
p. 94. 89, 113 ; cf. Itinerariunt, vol. R. S.

4 Hoveden, 368 ; Ansbert, 5. p. 63.

5 Expeditio Asiatica Friderici, in ' R. de Diceto, 648.

A A

854 MEMORIALS OK THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

to bring an army by land through Asia Minor, Armenia, and
Antioch ; to seize the Damietta mouth of the Nile, and occupy the
isthmus ; or to land an army on the coast, and open the shortest
line of communication between Jerusalem and the Mediterranean.
By the first route the German Crusaders were expected ; but they
would not be able to pass Acre, even if they could bring with them
their own provisions. An Egyptian campaign was very hopeless
whilst Saladin was in possession of Ascalon, and the experience of
the later Crusades shows us that it was impracticable. The third
plan was the most feasible every way. The besieging force might be
supplied both from Tyre and from the sea : if Acre was taken the
line of coast from thence to Joppa was easily to be overrun, and
after that the route to Jerusalem was open.

A few days after the siege began, Saladin brought up an immense
force to crush the besieging army, and occupied the range of hills
that surround the plain of Acre. The month of September, however,
brought up the Northern fleet ; the Flemings, under James of
Avesnes, quickly followed ; next came the counts of Dreux, Bar,
and Brienne, and the warlike Philip of Beauvais. The nobles of
Champagne came next, then the landgrave of Thuringia, who
persuaded the marquis, with 1,000 knights and 20,000 serving-men,
to join the siege.1 The battle of the fourth of October, in which
Gerard of Bideford perished, seems to have convinced the princes
that there was no hope of driving away the forces of the Sultan, and
they proceeded to intrench their own camp and to invest the city.
The struggle for the possession of the harbour was decided in favour
of the Crusaders in a battle fought in March 1190. In the July of
that year they were reinforced by a large army of French pilgrims,
and Archbishop Baldwin, with the English contingent, followed in
October. The great increase in numbers, the scarcity and badness
of the provisions, the despairing impatience of the soldiers, produced
almost directly after a terrible demoralisation in the army. Pesti-
lence followed ; and at that moment the jealousies of the leaders
broke out into open quarrels.

Guy of Lusignan was a brave soldier, a good commander, an
honourable and generous enemy, and a faithful friend ; 2 but he had

1 R. de Diceto, 648; and p. 61, is nothing to show that Patrick was

vol. B. 8. not killed in fair fight, but, as he was

* Guy was obliged by Henry II. to returning from Compostella, the sacri-

fly from Poictou in 1168, for his share lege was punished by Guy's exile,

in the death of Patrick earl of Salis- Unfortunately for the character of

bury. Hoveden,2iJ4 V. ; Gervase,1403; the family, Geoffrey the brother of

Trivet, 62, from R. de Monte, 904. Guy was obliged to fly in 1188 on a

Henry had just before burned the similar occasion : he had killed a great

Lusignan country and the castle of friend of Richard in an ambuscade,

the lord; R. de* Monte, 903. There Our author, at p. 350, vol. R.S., gives a

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

355

two great faults in the eyes of the native Franks : he was without
wealth or powerful connexions, and he was devoid of that craft which
in them took the place of strength and honest dealing. Conrad of
Montferrat,1 although at first objected to as an adventurer, soon
convinced them that his character was much more to their liking.
He was strong in the relationship of the emperors of both East and
West ; whilst Guy came of a family which, though honourable for
antiquity, possessed as yet only a third-rate fief, and that by a very
questionable title : he was rich, ruthless in enmity, faithless in
friendship, cunning and unscrupulous enough to pass for an Italian
of a later age ; and withal, a famous captain by sea and land.2

Guy had never been able to gain possession of his kingdom, and
Conrad was determined that he never should. As the master of Tyre,
he was able to get the first word with every convoy of pilgrims that
landed there on their way to Acre ; and his success in this direction,
from the very opening of the siege, may be calculated by comparing,
with the 700 knights and 9,000 serving-men with whom Guy sat
down before Acre, the thousand knights and 20,000 followers whom
the marquis brought up a month after.3

Guy, however, remained at the head of the besieging force only
a very short time. James of Avesnes, a knight of great valour and

character of Guy, to whom, as a
partisan of Richard, he was attached :
at p. 71, however, he gives a story of
his saving the life of the Marquis
Conrad, which counterbalances all
that is said against him. William of
Newburgh, ii. 88, calls him 'vir
strenuissimus.' He belonged to a
family which was not only personally
hostile to Richard, but whose interests
were opposed to his own. His brother
Hugh of Lusignan had contrived to
secure the county of La Marche, the
reversion of which had been purchased
by Henry II. in 1177. Hoveden, 326.
Geoffrey had been one of the tools of
Henry in his hostility to his son.
Diceto, 639. Under these circum-
stances Richard's support of Guy as
king of Jerusalem is curious, and
still more his anxiety to provide him
with the kingdom of Cyprus. Hugh
X., count of La Marche, who married
the widow of King John, was a
nephew of Guy.

1 Conrad is described by Richard
of Devizes, p. 52, as ' vir leviannigena,'
a son of Leviathan, the crooked
serpent. Bohadin in several places
celebrates both his craft and prowess,
pp. 91, 135, 170, 214. He had gained

a great reputation in both empires,
but lost both his credit and life by
his selfish conduct in Palestine. Yet
the levying of the Crusade was in
great measure done by his exertions.
Bohadin, 91. He had some difficulty
in overcoming the dislike of the native
Franks. Diceto, 642. Three mar-
quises of Montferrat are mentioned in
this book : William the old marquis
(called in the Chronique d'Outremer,
c. 588, Boniface, and confounded by
the author of the Expeditio Asiatica
Friderici, Canisius, v. 501, with his
son Reiner, king of Thessalonica), who
was taken prisoner at Hittin (see
vol. R. S. p. 23) ; William Longaspata,
his son, and brother of Conrad, Reiner,
and Boniface ; and Conrad himself.

2 ' Fuit autem Conradus armis
strenuus, ingenio et scientia sagacissi-
mus, animo et facto amabilis, cunctis
mundanis virtutibus prasditus, in
omni consilio supremus, spes blanda
suorum et hostium fulmen ignitum,
simulator et dissimulator in omni re,
omnibus signis instructus; respectu
cujus facundissimi reputabantur elin-
gues.' Historia Teme Sanctse, Eccard,.
ii. 1353.

3 R. de Diceto, 648.

A A2

856 MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

experience, very early superseded him, and he was shortly after
obliged to share the command with the landgrave, whose only title
to it seems to have been his rank and influence. In July 1190,
Henry of Champagne, who represented both his uncles, Richard and
Philip, succeeded James. Two months after, the duke of Suabia,
who had been induced by Conrad to come to Acre, was put forward
by him as a candidate for the command. But this minor contest
was soon merged in the more important struggle for the kingdom
between Guy and Conrad. Queen Sibylla and her children died
about October 1190, and left the succession to her sister Isabel, who
was divorced from Henfrid of Kerak and married to the marquis
immediately after, in spite of the excommunication pronounced
against them by Archbishop Baldwin, the vicegerent of the patri-
arch.1 The duke of Suabia died in January 1191.

Immediately after his wedding Conrad left for Tyre, and
although he had bought the consent of many of the princes to the
marriage, by liberal promises of provisions to be sent to the besiegers,
he seems to have troubled himself very little more about Acre, until
the arrival of Philip in the following April. The famine and
pestilence lasted from November to February.2

Philip immediately on his arrival threw himself into Conrad's
party, probably having been already engaged by the Genoese. Guy,
in order to avoid being summarily dispossessed of his throne, was
compelled to seek Richard in Cyprus, and to beg his aid. This was
readily given ; Richard never flinched in his support of the king.
Conrad, as soon as he heard of the approach of the English king,
prepared to return to Tyre.3 He had already lost the confidence of
the Frank nobles ; and the princes of Antioch and Tripoli,4 as well
as the luckless Henfrid, were on the side of Guy. Conrad ordered
Tyre to be closed against Richard, and on his arrival at Acre did not
venture to answer the complaints laid against him by Guy, and
enforced with wager of battle by his brother Geoffrey. Philip, how-
ever, not content with recalling Conrad and placing him at the head
of his household and council, further alienated Richard by claiming
a half of Cyprus, according to the letter of their original alliance.
Richard answered by demanding half of the county of Flanders,

1 The important point that Sibylla's marriage was not concluded for some

death preceded the marriage of Conrad time after his arrival, and the negotia-

and Isabel seems to be proved by an tions that preceded it took place at

unpublished letter in the Lambeth Acre.
MS. 415, from a chaplain of Bald- * Hoveden, H87 v«.

win to the convent of Canterbury. * Bohadin, 170 ; Hoveden, 894 V.
This letter is dated Oct. 21st; Sibylla 4 Hoveden, 393 v». The new princo

was then dead. Baldwin had only of Tripoli, Raymond III., wns the son

arrived at Acre on the 10th. The of Bohemond III. of Antioch.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 357

which Philip had claimed as an escheat a few days before. The
dispute was, however, reconciled, and a new agreement made for the
future.

Acre surrendered on the 12th of July : the True Cross was to be
restored, and a ransom paid for the prisoners of 200,000 Saracenic
talents : according to Bohadin the marquis was to have, over and
above, 10,000 talents for his share in the capitulation, and his
knights 4,000 more.1 A few days later the princes came to an
agreement, by which Conrad waived his claim to the present
possession of the kingdom, and was confirmed in his tenure of Tyre,
and right of succession. He then withdrew to Tyre : Philip
returned home : the duke of Burgundy took the command of the
French. The whole of the expense, and most of the labour of the
last year of the Crusade, fell on Eichard ; and Conrad from that
moment set himself in determined opposition to him, adopting a
course which completely frustrated the purpose of the expedition.

Richard was not yet awake to the difficulty of his position. His
health had failed almost immediately after his arrival, and his allies
had deserted him ; yet on the 6th of August he wrote from Acre to
the justiciar that the Holy Land would soon be restored to its former
state, and by the next Lent he should set out on his return.2 As
late as the first of October he retained this hope.3

The plan of Richard and the Frank princes was to carry out the
programme begun by Guy with the siege of Acre. That city was to
be for the time the headquarters of the Crusade : the line of coast
from thence to Joppa was to be secured, and then the road from
Joppa to Jerusalem. Richard accordingly, marching past Haipha,
which had been burned by Saladin four days before Acre was
surrendered, proceeded to Caesarea, which he found deserted ; and
thence, harassed at every step by Saladin, who followed in a parallel
line of march, towards Arsuf or Arsur, the ancient Apollonia.
Before he reached this city Saladin compelled him to fight a general
battle, which ended in so decided a victory for the Crusaders that
Saladin, in a panic, ordered the demolition of all the strongholds
except Jerusalem, Kerak, and Darum. From Arsiif, where James of
Avesnes was slain, the army went on to Joppa, which they reached
on the 10th of September, having occupied nearly three weeks in
marching less than 60 miles. Seven weeks were spent in fortifying
Joppa and two villages on the road to Ramlah ; on the 81st of

1 Bohadin, 179. Quadragesimam mare intrabimus.'

2 ' Sed quam citius terrain Suriae in Bichard to the Justiciar, MS. Lambeth,
pristinum statum revocaverimus, tune 415, fo. 90 v°.

in terram nostram revertemur. Itaque 3 Letter from Richard to the abbot

pro certo scias quod ad proximam of Clairvaux. Hoveden, 398.

858 MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

October they set out for Jerusalem, Saladin retreating step by step
before them, and dismantling the fortresses on the road. Richard
moved first from Joppa to Yazour,1 Saladin, who had destroyed
Bamlah, being then at Latroon ; on the 16th of November * Richard
marched from Yazour towards Ramlah, and Saladin dismantled
Latroon and retired to Tel-al-sjusour. Three weeks after, the van-
guard of the army reached Latroon,3 and Saladin almost directly
retired into Jerusalem. After Christmas the Crusaders proceeded to
Beit-Nuba, enduring the utmost misery from the weather and want
of provisions, which were intercepted by predatory detachments of
Turks, who came down from the mountains and from the garrison
of Masjdeljaba. After perils of every sort, the available force being
impeded and embarrassed with crowds of useless pilgrims, they were
compelled to halt. Having come almost within sight of Jerusalem,
the leaders found their council divided. There is no doubt that, had
they proceeded at once, they might have taken the Holy City. But
the object of the native Franks was not to recover Jerusalem : only
to keep the pilgrims in Palestine until they had recovered their own
possessions. Jerusalem once taken, the pilgrims would go home,
and Saladin come back more terrible than ever ; the city could not
be held, if it were taken, without garrisoning all the forts along the
line of route ; and for this there was not sufficient force in the
country : the hundreds of thousands who were to have done it had
perished by famine and pestilence before Acre. The French, it was
said, jealous of the leadership of Richard, began to straggle back
from Ramlah to Joppa. At last, on Saint Hilary's day, the council
determined to retreat,4 and to occupy Ascalon, or even to invade

1 Bohadin, 211. Saladin retreated avant ; car le due de Bourgoingne s'en

from Ramlah to Latroon on the 5th retournoit ariere, pour ce sanz, plus,

of October ; Ramlah and Lydda were que Ten ne deist que lea Anglois

condemned on the 25th Sept. Bo- n'eussent pris Jerusalem. Tandis que

hadin, 202, 204. il estoient en ces paroles un sien

* Bohadin, 220. The destruction chevalier 11 escria : " Sire, Sire, venez

of Latroon was begun as early as jusques ci, et je vous mousterrai

October 5. Ibid. 204. Jerusalem." Et quant il oy ce, il

1 Hoveden, 406; pp. 298, 299, geta sa cote & armer devant sea yex

vol. R. 8. tout en plorant, et dit a Nostre-

4 It is to this point of time that the Seigneur : " Biau Sire Diex, je te pri

story told by Joinville (ed. Didot, Paris, que tu ne seuff res que je voie ta sainte

1859, p. 172) is to be referred, if it is cite, puisque je ne la puis delivrer des

true. It should be compared with the mains de tes ennemis." ' The latter

false report told by Benedict of Peter- part of the story applies better to the

borough, ii. 721. 'II atirerent leur second retreat : see vol. li. S. p. 369. I

gent, et fist le roy d'Angleterre la do not see how the circumstances can

premiere bataille, et le duo de Bour- bo true, but it is certain that the

goingne 1'autre apres, & tout les gens desertion of the French on the first

le roy de France. Tandis que il occasion prevented the capture of

estoient & esme de prendre la ville, en Jerusalem. Bohadin, pp. 8, 9.
li manda de 1'ost le due que il n'alast

MEMOEIALS OF THE EEIGN OF KICHAKD I. 359

Egypt, before proceeding to take Jerusalem. Kichard, in compliance
with this decision, immediately moved southwards, the French
lending him a very feeble support : after two days' march, unim-
peded by the Saracens, he came to Ascalon. The spring was spent
in the rebuilding the walls of Ascalon, the occupation of Gaza,
Beit-Gebrin, and Tel-es-safieh, which were deserted, and the capture
of Darum from the garrison placed there by Saladin.

The death of the Marquis Conrad, in April, reunited the con-
tending parties under Henry of Champagne : Guy gave up his claims
to the crown, and another march to Jerusalem was projected. As
the first had been undertaken in the depth of winter, the second fell
at a still more unfortunate time, the height of summer. Richard
going north from Ascalon, and the other princes south from Acre,
the two armies met at Beit-Nuba, and there again they stayed.
Again the council was divided, the same arguments were brought
forward, the impossibility of an advance was proved, Richard himself
being convinced of it ; the French, on the principle of contradiction
now insisting on the capture of Jerusalem. The armies had hardly
met when they were separated, and this time finally. Richard,
broken down in health and distracted with the conflicting messages
that reached him from home, proceeded to Acre on his way to
Europe. Thence he was recalled by the attack of Saladin on Joppa ;
he added one more splendid victory to the list of his fruitless glories,
and then made peace.

Such is, in a few words, the record of the Crusade given us in
the book before us, and the other Christian histories. From the
Saracen writers we learn the details of the diplomatic struggle that
was going on during the entire course of it, and which only emerges
from time to time in the narrative of our author.

Saladin was at no point of the Crusade secure of victory. The
armies he had to manage were almost as intractable and soluble as
those of the pilgrims ; he himself had no violent hatred against the
Christians : nay, if we may believe the story told by Hoveden, he
would have gladly purchased their friendship and alliance against
the rebellious princes of Mesopotamia, by the surrender of Jerusa-
lem, and the restoration of most of the strongholds of Palestine.1

1 July 6, 1191 : Hoveden, f. 395, them an alliance against Saladin. I

and Bromton, col. 1204. Also July may as well mention here that I have

14, Bromton, 1206 ; Hoveden, 396. quoted Bromton's compilation gene-

Saladin wanted aid against Koth- rally, only in those passages in which

beddin, the son of Noureddin, whom his account represents Benedict of

these writers call the lord of Musse, Peterborough, as being more easily

by which they perhaps meant Mosul. referred to than Hearne's very scarce

He was lord of Diarbeker. On the edition of the latter author.
16th of July, Kothbeddin proposed to

860 MEMORIALS OF THE REION OF RICHARD I.

But whether he was sincere in this offer or not, he thought it
advisable to temporise, and, being well acquainted with the divided
counsels of his enemies, to play them off one against another.
During the siege of Acre, intercourse more or less friendly had
taken place between the Sultan and Richard, and on one occasion an
interview was arranged between Richard and Saphadin, which the
council interfered to prevent.1 Still, presents were exchanged ;
Saladin sent snow and fruit for the sick king," and the messengers
went to and fro until the massacre of the Saracen prisoners put a
stop for the time to proceedings of more than doubtful consequence.
The only result seems to have been to create a suspicion against
Richard in the mind of his allies.

Richard's misgivings as to the final success of the expedition
clearly originated during the march to Joppa : both parties then
measured each other's strength. On the 3rd of September, four
days before the battle of Arsuf, Richard opened negotiations with
Saphadin. The two heroes met on that day,3 Henfrid of Toron
acting as interpreter. Saphadin inquired on what terms peace
would be accepted. Richard demanded the immediate possession of
the whole country. This was at once refused. The same demand
was made on the 12th of September,4 two days after the arrival of
the army at Joppa ; and this time the Sultan was in such a panic
that, although in words he flatly refused to entertain the proposal,
he constituted his brother Saphadin plenipotentiary, for the conclu-
sion of a treaty.

Conrad of Monferrat, seeing his downfall certain in the event of
a peace concluded by Richard, now began to communicate with

1 June 17, Richard asked an inter- Saphadin accepted the present on

view with Saladin ; the answer was, condition of being allowed to make

' Kings do not meet for conversation, one in return. The messenger then

unless they have first made a treaty; explained that the present destined

and it would not be decorous for them, for Saladin was some hawks ; these

having talked and eaten together, to were sick, and required to be fed on

stir up war. If King Richard desires poultry, which he asked Saphadin to

this, the terms of peace must be send. Saphadin laughed, and said,

settled first. Moreover, we must have ' The king wants the poultry for

an interpreter in whom we can both himself.' On the first of July he sent

trust. If these conditions can be n Moslem captive as a present to

fulfilled, by Ood's will we will meet.' Saladin ; Saladin returned him with a

Bohadin, If',;). After this, frequent rich dress and presents, p. 172.
messages were exchanged, but without * July 4 : Bohadin, 176. On the

effect. At the end of the month, the 15th of July Richard sent some hawks

Sultan agreed that Saphadin should and harriers to the Sultan : Bromton,

meet Richard in the plain, in the c. 1206. On the 31st of July Saladin

presence of both armies. The Chris- requested information about the

tian princes having interfered to pre- Christian faith, pretending that he

vent this (p. 171), Richard excused might be converted. Ibid. 1210.
himself on the ground of illness, ' Bohadin, 193.

proffering a present to the Sultan. ' Ibid. 200.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 301

Saladin.1 He offered, if Sidon and Berytus were secured to Mm, to
join Saladin, proclaim war against the Franks, and besiege Acre.
Saladin replied that if he would give proof of his sincerity by
joining the Moslem forces at once, Sidon and Berytus should be
given him, but not otherwise. The lord of Sidon, who acted as
Conrad's ambassador, was magnificently received by the Sultan in
November ; 2 he brought the news that Conrad was willing imme-
diately to break with the Christians on the specified conditions.

Side by side with this intrigue, the negotiations for peace pro-
ceeded between Eichard and Saphadin. They were renewed early in
October ; :; on the 16th Saphadin accepted a horse from Eichard ; 4
and on the 18th we find Eichard considerably abating his terms, and
in fact almost appealing ad misericordiam. He said that Moslems
and Franks were alike perishing ; the country was utterly wasted ;
the prize for which they were contending was perishing from both
of them. They had both done their duty as warriors for religion ;
nothing remained to be decided but the possession of the Holy City
and the True Cross, and the division of the country. Jerusalem, as
the mother of the Christian faith, ought to belong to the Christians ;
the wood of the Cross was valueless in the sight of the Moslems :
both might easily be given up. As for the country, let Jordan be
the frontier between the two powers ; only let there be peace.5
Saladin replied that the Holy City was as dear to the Moslems
as to the Christians : nay, more so, for thence the Prophet took his
night-ride, and there the angels were wont to meet. He would
not, therefore, retire from the city or surrender the country, which
naturally belonged to his nation, and had only fallen into Christian
hands in consequence of the weakness of the Moslems. As for
the Cross, it was indeed a scandal, and an offence to God, and
could not be surrendered except to gain some great end for the true
faith.6

On the 21st Eichard made a new proposition to Saphadin.7 He
offered him his sister, Queen Joanna, in marriage : she might be
queen of Jerusalem, and Saphadin king, if Saladin would endow his
brother with Palestine, give up the Cross to the king of England,
and leave the military orders in possession of their strongholds.
This message was sent on to Saladin, who doubted Eichard's good
faith, and thought it a good plan to pretend acquiescence, throwing
the onus of the next move upon the Franks. The result was as he

1 Bohadin, 204. Saladin's answer ' Bohadin, 207.
was given on the 4th of October. 5 Ibid. '207.

2 November 3 : Bohadin, 214. His 6 Ibid. 208.

interview with Saladin took place on 7 Ibid. 209. This author was

the 9th : Bohadin, 217. himself the messenger who brought

3 Oct. 5. : Bohadin, 204. the report of this offer to Saladin.

362 MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

expected.1 The lady refused to marry a Moslem ; Saphadin must
become a Christian ; the question of peace might remain open until
a decided answer could be given. Saphadin, however, did not look
on these negotiations as binding him to pacific conduct. On the
6th of November2 we find Richard remonstrating with him on
account of the ambuscade laid for his forces at Bombrac. An
interview between the two princes resulted from this. They met on
the 8th,3 but with no other issue than to increase the odium against
Richard among the princes of the Crusade. Saladin refused to see
him, and his demands were further abated to a request that the
country should be divided between himself and Saphadin.4

On the llth of November5 the Sultan laid the rival proposals
of Conrad and Richard before his council, and those of the king were
accepted. Saphadin might marry Joanna, and the two should have
the whole kingdom between them. Richard, alarmed at the accept-
ance of an offer which could not be carried out without covering him
with shame, and of the feasibility of which he was by no means sure,
informed the Sultan that the question must be referred to the pope.
Joanna was a widow, and could not be remarried without the
apostolic sanction ; but if consent were refused, Eleanor of Brittany,
his niece, would be a fair bride for Saphadin, and as she was a
maiden in his ward no papal consent need be sued for. Saladin, on
the 15th,6 replied to this that he could listen to no such proposition :
his brother would have the queen of Sicily or none at all. He at
the same time renewed the plenipotentiary authority of Saphadin,
and gave him instructions to temporise. No more was said after
this about the marriage.7

During the vinter months the intercourse seems to have been
broken off. Saladin disbanded his forces, and remained in panic at
Jerusalem ; the Crusaders were perishing at Ramlah. Early in the
spring Richard made a new bid for peace.

On the 20th of March, 1192,8 Henfrid of Toron, and Abubeker
the gatekeeper, reopened negotiations in behalf of Richard. ' It has
been agreed,' they stated, ' that we should divide Palestine ; so be it :
let Jerusalem be ours ; you can keep, if you like, the mosque
Es-Sakra.' A week later Saladin answered that, reversing the

1 Siiliulin's acceptance was notified Franks saw Reginald of Sidon riding

on the 25th of October, and the refusal out with Saphadin.

of Joanna was reported to the Sultan ' Nothing is said about this marriage

the same day. Bohadin, 210. by our author, who believed that the

Bohadin, 216. negotiations were broken off because

Bohadin, 216 ; Itinerarium, vol. the Sultan would not restore Montreal :

R. S. p. 296. vol. R. S. p. 297. Abulfeda also men-

Bohadin, 217. tions the proposal : Excerpta, p. 61.

Ibid. 219. " Bohadin, 222.

Ibid. 230. On this day the

MEMORIALS OF THE EEIGN OF RICHARD I. 363

conditions, he was willing to treat. ' You may have the church of
the Eesurrection, but the city and citadel of Jerusalem must be ours.'
This was inadmissible, and the matter again dropped. Saladin was
besieged by the messengers of Conrad, and at the same time pressed
with an insurrection in Mesopotamia. He agreed on a peace with
the marquis,1 and left Richard to the conquest of the south. If
Conrad would break with the Franks, he should have a treaty on the
terms that Eichard had refused, Ascalon not being included in
the surrender. A week after this Conrad was assassinated.

After the second retreat from Beit-Nuba, Richard again lowered
his demands. He was now convinced of the hopelessness of the
Crusade, and anxious to return home. The Franks of the kingdom
were neither desirous of his aid nor worth his trouble : if he could
but get an honourable peace he would be content. He declared him-
self ready to accept Saladin's terms ; Count Henry, the newly-chosen
king, should be his friend and ally ; the Christians should have the
Holy Sepulchre, the coast, and the plain, of which they were now in
possession ; the Saracens might keep the city of Jerusalem and the
hill country. These were Saladin's own proposals of the last March,
but the Christians were now much stronger in the south, and Ascalon
was a new bone of contention. Ascalon, Saladin answered, must be
destroyed. Richard would not hear of this ; but, seeing it was
impossible for him to retain his conquests in the south, he ordered
Darum to be dismantled, and all the remaining strength of the
Crusaders to be devoted to the maintenance of Ascalon.2 The
Sultan resumed hostilities, and the contest of Joppa followed.
Richard now saw the bitter truth : he was, in fact, at Saladin's
mercy. After an ignominious entreaty 3 for compensation for the

1 Bohadin, 223, 224. Saladin re- mosque in Constantinople, and in-

ceived the last proposal of Conrad formed Saladin in triumph of the de-

on the 21st of April ; returned his struction of the German Crusaders,

answer on the 24th ; and received the Ibid. p. 130. Diceto, 642.
news of his death on the 1st of May. 2 The chronology and authorities

On the 15th of May Saladin received for this negotiation are given in vol.

an embassy from the Emperor Isaac R. S. p. 398, note 1.
Angelus, proposing that the True Cross 3 Aug. 27. ' Abubeker related that

should be given up to the Greeks, as he had had a private conversation

well as the Church of the Holy with the king, and that he had said to

Sepulchre and other holy places : on him, " Entreat my brother, Al Malek

these terms he was ready to make an Al Adil (Saphadin), to see how he can

alliance, offensive and defensive, with procure for me and conclude a peace

the Sultan, and join him in invading with the Sultan, so that he shall not

Cyprus. Two days after, the Sultan grudge to yield Ascalon to me ; for

returned answer, rejecting utterly the then I shall immediately depart,

imperial proposition, and adding that After that he will have to do only

he had refused to sell the Cross to the with a small handful, from whom he

king of Georgia for 200,000 pieces of will easily take away these countries,

gold. Bohadin, 226. The same em- I, for my part, have no other object

peror had, in 1190, offered to open a than to save my own reputation among

864 MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

expenses of Ascalon, he was compelled to agree to the sacrifice of
that place, next in importance to Acre itself. A truce for three
years, so purchased, was the lame and impotent conclusion of this
great and costly undertaking.1

By this agreement the Christians remained in possession of Tyre,
Casal Ymbert, Acre, Haipha, Cresarea, Arsuf, and Joppa ; hut their
occupation was strictly confined to the coast. The inland appurten-
ances of those lordships were withheld by the Sultan : Nazareth and
Sepphoris were excepted from the cession of Acre, Yebna (Ibelin) and
Masjdeljaba (Mirabel) from that of Joppa.3 The casal of Maen, on
the road from Joppa to Jerusalem, was the utmost limit of inland
occupation allowed by Saladin ; and it was not until the day on
which the treaty was signed that he consented to the retention of
Lydda and Bamlah as compensation for the walls of Ascalon.3 To
these concessions he afterwards added the gift of Kaimoun to Balian
and his wife Queen Mary, and that of Sarepta to Reginald of Sidon.1

These towns represented the fruit of the whole labour of Europe
during five years, of the expenditure of an unparalleled amount of
life and treasure, of the several intrigues in the conflicting interests
of the native and foreign Franks, and of the extraordinary prowess
of the greatest soldiers of Christendom. The West threw itself with
all its strength upon the East, and recoiled broken and dispirited,
more by its own divisions than by any irresistible barrier. All except
Tyre and Acre was won by Richard.

The length to which these remarks have run must be my excuse
for not having discussed the two important questions, what were the
causes and what were the consequences of the Crusades in Europe,
and more especially in England. The scene, however, of the whole
action of the present book is external to England, whilst the treat-
ment of those subjects belongs more properly to a work connected

the Franks. But if the Sultan will three years from the same date. But

not give up Ascalon, at least let him Bohadin, p. 259, dates the beginning

refund the money I have spent on the of the truce from the day of signing,

fortifications." ' Bohadin, 258. These September 2.

words, which were doubtless the true - Aug. 29. Bohadin, 258 ; Diceto,
expression of Richard's feelings, arc c. 667 ; Abulfeda, Excerpta, 56.
made by Michaud the ground of a ' Sept. 2 : Bohadin, 261. Accord-
charge of deliberate dishonesty against ing to Hoveden, 408, and Abulfarajius
him. (Bruns1 Excerpta, Oxford, 1780), Sala-
1 For the details of this negotiation, din paid in money for the walls of
see vol. R. 3. p. 427, note 7. The truce Ascalon. This doubtless gave occasion
was to be, according to R. de Diceto, for the reproach of the German writers
c. 668, and W. Newburgh, ii. 87, for that Richard had sold Ascalon to the
three years, three months, three weeks, Turks.

three days, and three hours, to begin 4 Cont. W. Tyr. ap. Martene et

from the following Easter ; and Hove- Durand ; Amplissima ColUctio, v.

den, f. 408, says that it was to last 640.

MEMOKIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 365

immediately with the internal history of the kingdom. I may be
allowed, however, to say that I believe the Crusades to have been
caused by a movement as religious as the Reformation, and much less
connected with political objects, and to have shared, with almost all
purely religious movements, in the baneful results which seem in-
separable from any source of popular excitement. As to the direct
consequences of the Crusades, a generation which has witnessed the
Crimean war, and traced in its causes and course no indistinct parallel
with the events of the third Crusade, cannot suppose that they have
ceased directly to affect the history of the Christian world, although
the state of Palestine at the present day differs little from what it
was when Godfrey of Bouillon undertook the conquest.

As for the indirect consequences of these great undertakings, it is
not too much to say that they have affected, and still remotely do
affect, almost every political and social question. To treat of them
in all their bearings would require a great work, and no satisfactory
sketch of them could be compressed into the bulk of a Preface.

CHKONICLES AND MEMOKIALS OF THE
EEIGN OF RICHARD I. VOL. II.

EPISTOL^E CANTUARIENSES. A.D. 1187-1199.

[THK above volume contains letters of the Prior and Convent of Christ
Church, Canterbury, during Richard I.'s reign. The history of the
Church of England during that reign ' is a record of five great disputes
and appeals ' which are connected with the ecclesiastical quarrels of
Henry II. They are also valuable as throwing light on the relations
of Church and State in the reign of John. Bishop Stubbs in the
following Preface sketches the history of Monasticisiu in England, and
lays special stress upon the struggles which in Norman and Angevin
times arose between Popes and English kings. The contrast which he
draws between the tactics of the Courts of Home and England in
Henry II.'s reign is illuminating, and the whole Preface will be read
with great interest.]

Pecnliar
prestige
of early
moimchUm
in England

coeval with
Christianity
in England

THE history of monastic and other religious establishments in
England differs in very many respects from that of similar institutions
among those nations which had been civilised and settled subjects
of the Roman empire. Whatever remains of such civilisation or
settlement existed in Britain after the departure of the Romans
were swept away by the Anglo-Saxon invasion, and the work of
civilisation and Christianity had to be begun from the beginning in
the sixth and seventh centuries. The conversion of England was
accomplished principally, if not entirely, by monks either of the
Roman or of the Irish school ; and thus the monastic institution
was not, as among the earlier converted nations, an innovation which
rested its claims for reverence on the sanctity or asceticism of its
professors : it was coeval with Christianity itself : it was the herald
of the Gospel to kings and people, and added the right of gratitude
to that of religious respect or superstitious awe. Hence the system
occupied in England and in the countries converted by English
missionaries a position more really honourable and better maintained
than elsewhere. Although the monasteries of France and Italy were
larger and politically more powerful than those of England, they did

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 367

not enjoy the same place in the affections of the people, nor were its counex-
they either so purely national, or nurseries of patriotic spirit in the iSttonai life.
same way. It may be added that whilst in the Latin speaking p^rVc^e0™"
countries the history of monachism is one long record of corruptions purity
and reforms, in which constant changes and the institutions of new
rules were insufficient to counteract increasing decline, the English
monasteries were free from most of the evils that prevailed abroad.
The fact that no important new rule of monastic life was indigenous
in a country so famous for the number of its monastic houses seems
to prove that no crying necessity for moral reformation was ever
made out. The new foreign rules were at times freely adopted ; the
Cistercian rule in particular was extremely popular almost from its
foundation, but the more ancient monasteries continued to call
themselves Benedictine without a difference ; and although the
Cluniac reformation was coeval with the monastic revival under Odo,1
and probably exercised some influence upon it, there is no instance
of the formal introduction of that rule before the Norman Conquest.
The great influx of foreign monachism that then set in was one of
the smallest effects of that event on the character of the English
convents.

The apostles of England, Augustine and Mellitus, Aidan, Finnan character of
and Fursey, Chad and Cedd, Wilfrid and Egwin, although the fashion En'gUsiT
of their tonsures differed, all professed the threefold obligation of missionary"'
humility, chastity, and poverty. In the best of these and of their n
immediate followers, the ascetic and the missionary characters were
happily blended. Their devout retirement was a means of gaining
rest and strength of body, mind, and spirit for new work. Every
good missionary must be an ascetic ; so for the first century of the
conversion every monastery was a mission station, and every mission
station a monastery. As the country became more thickly peopled,
and the people more generally Christianised, a settled clergy took
the place of the missionaries. The settled clergy were not bound
by monastic rule, but were allowed to hold property, and probably
to marry, although the marriage of the Anglo-Saxon clergy at so
early a period is not so well ascertained as it is later on, and in the
ages immediately before and after the Conquest. The characters
and status of clerk and monk were not so sharply separated as they
afterwards became ; the Benedictine was but a lax follower of the

1 Odo sought the tonsure and his stec. v. p. 131. Oswald of Worcester

monastic education at Fleury in or was educated at, and oEthelwold of

about the year 942, the last year of Winchester learned discipline from,

the life of Odo of Cluny, who was en- the same famous house. Mab.

gaged in reforming that monastery. Act. SS. seec. v. pp. 601, 709, <fec., and

Ang. Sac. ii. 82. Mabillon, Ada Sanct. Hist. Earns, ap. Gale, pp. 391, 392.

868

MEMORIALS OF THE REION OF RICHARD I.

The ml*-
Monnry
»tane ends,
anil the
lenrned

The learned
period of
English
monnohistu

Diversion of

missionary

zeal

Wider sepa-
ration be-
tween secu-
lar clergy
itnd monks

rule of S. Benedict, the priest had not yet arrived at the comforts
and luxuries of an independent life and definite position.

As, however, the needs of mission work became less exigent, and
the established clergy further removed from monachisra, a change
necessarily took place in the character of the monasteries. Some
became the cells of anchorites, as Lindisfarne, Crowland, and
Glastonbury : some became schools of learning, as Canterbury and
Malmesbury. The spirit brought by Theodore and Adrian into the
south, and by Benedict Biscop into the north of England, combined
a stricter rule of life with the love of learning, cultivation of manners,
and tact in association with the world. Theodore was the great
administrative founder of the Church, and his introduction of learning
into the country fell most fortunately at a moment when the zeal
of missionary adventure began to look abroad for fresh fields of
work, and but for this the monasteries would have sunk, one and
all, into the follies of a stupid and mischievous asceticism. This
learned period may be considered to have extended from the year
669 to the middle of the following century in the south of England ;
and about fifty years longer in the north, where the example of Bede,
and the munificence of Archbishop Egbert and his successors, had
an influence on the cultivation of letters which at once culminated
and expired in the glories of Alcuin.

The better portion of the monastic spirit, which was neither
devoted to learned pursuits nor lost in the asceticism of the
marshlands, found abundance of missionary work in Germany and
Friesland. Boniface and his companions, although personally and
in principle far more self-denying than the monks they left at home,
and in theory quite as much devoted to the monastic ideal, were
practically guided by earnest Christian zeal, and showed unwearied
industry in their great work. No man saw more clearly than
Boniface, or spoke more plainly of, the evils inherent in the monastic
system where it depends on asceticism alone : the utter worthlessness
of the prayers of men whose hands do not work for the things they
pray for.

The middle of the eighth century witnessed a rapid degeneration
in monastic discipline ; and at the same time we begin to see more
clearly the demarcation between the character of the monastic and
that of the secular priest : the monastery becomes distinguished from
the college of clerks and the cathedral minster. The Council of
Clovesho, of 747,1 marks both the increase of selfishness and ex-
clusiveness in the monks, and the release of the clergy generally from
the monastic bond. An attempt seems to have been made, probably
originating in the remonstrances of Bede and Boniface, to reduce
1 Spelman, Cone. i. 242, Ac.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 369

the true monasteries to the Benedictine model, and to put an end to
the fraudulent perversions of religious foundations to serve the ends
of secular avarice. Almost at the same time the institution of a institution
new rule for priests living in community, a measure the credit of
which is due to Chrodegang, archbishop of Metz, gave to the clergy
who were not under monastic vows a dignified and creditable status
which they had not before possessed. This system, although never
introduced in detail into England,1 served as a model on which
colleges of clerks or canons were incorporated, and quickly com-
mended itself to those who wished the clergy to do a good work in
the world, and to retain the advantage of monastic superintendence
and corporate feeling, without the trammels of a rule which hindered
their practical efficiency. The monks and priests, who had until
now lived together, separated. Their rival churches began to rise side
by side in the larger cities : disputes arose as to ancient gifts of
property, whether they belonged to the clergy as clergy, or to the
monks, the successors of those who had been both monks and clergy-
men ; and whether the original foundations of particular houses
were or were not monastic. The popularity of monachism began to
decline, and the charms of the secular life to draw away many
from the stricter rule. In 787 the legatine Council ordered by
special canon2 that monks should live monastically and canons Decay of
canonically. The dark age of monastic history had already set in, followed up'
and the veil drawn forcibly by the cruel ravages of the Northmen gtaicUon of
and Danes from 790 to 870 closed on a state of things so obscure mo"astorios
as to be unable to reveal its own condition.

The ninth century in England, until the reign of Alfred, is a
blank as to learning, sanctity, or practical activity. Swithun, the
one saint of the period, is vastly more mythical than the most
obscure of the heroes of the two preceding centuries. Learning
had reached the point at which, south of Humber. it was hard to
find a man who could read Latin.3 Devout men spent their active
energies in pilgrimages to Rome rather than in doing their duty ;
and when the Danes came in force, they fell on an enervated and
almost defenceless people. Monachism, for good or for evil, had
become (so far as the scanty notices of the chronicle teach us)
extinct before the reign of Alfred.4 Period at

Very few of the religious houses which perished during the mouaeiusm
Danish wars ever rose again from their ashes. The cathedrals and exthlct

1 W. Malmesb. Gesta Pontificum, There were many monasteries standing
lib. ii. p. 1548 (ed. Migne). empty in Asser's time ; either owing

2 Spelman, Cone. i. 294. to the ravages of war, or the contempt

3 King Alfred in Camden's Scrip- into which the regular life had fallen.
tores, p. 27. Alfred's attempts to revive it were

4 Asser : Camden's Scr. p. 18. failures ; ib. 19.

B B

370

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

Revival of
monnehbin
under differ-
ent circum-
stances and
character In
the tenth
century

It stilt re-
tained its
national

spirit

The policy
of Lanfranc
nnd the
Conqueror
with regard
to moiiM-
terieii

city monasteries were almost the only exceptions. Alfred's founda-
tion at Athelney bore the name of a monastery, and some pains
were taken by him to introduce into England learned monks from
France, Flanders, and Germany. The attempt, however, to restore
monachism against the sense of the nation was premature, and its
issue was so discouraging that his son Edward gave the New
Minster of Winchester to clerks instead of monks. It is certain
that in 942 there were no real Benedictines in England ; l Odo,
Oswald and probably Dunstan, sought the knowledge of true discipline
at Fleury, which had been just reformed under the spirit, if not
under the name, of the Cluniac revival.

Monachism, as introduced by Dunstan and worked by his disci-
ples, was a very different thing from what it had been before the
invasion. It was aggressive and self -asserting in an extreme degree.
It claimed the rights and territories of the ancient houses, and intro-
duced a spirit of persecution and tyranny altogether foreign to the
ancient character. Although it had no real pretension to represent
the system under which the country had been converted, it
took to itself at once the prerogative right to national grati-
tude. Not content with claiming the property of the old monasteries
which had fallen out of cultivation, or got into the hands of the
secular clergy, it insisted on the removal of the latter from
foundations to which they had at least an equal claim. It spared
neither spiritual terrors nor the commanding temporal influence
which it had obtained rather from the superstition of the kings than
from the ambition of the prelates. And yet it had its bright side ;
for it helped to cure great defects of moral discipline ; it prevented the
Church property from becoming the inheritance of a distinct priestly
caste ; it produced a revival of national learning ; and it still main-
tained, notwithstanding an occasional influx of foreign zealots, a
thoroughly national spirit. The bishops were the agents of the
change, and they acted on their own inherent authority, not at the
dictation of the court of Rome. This new movement lasted as long
as the supremacy of the family of Edgar. Cnut and Harold, as
practical men, founded colleges. Edward the Confessor revived the
monastic spirit with which he was himself pervaded ; and the
system which was extended and consolidated by Lanfranc was
inaugurated in his reign by the new foundation of Westminster.

The effect of the Norman Conquest in this matter was peculiar
and important. It owed its character indirectly to the two power-
ful minds that were at the head of the Church and State. Lanfranc
.saw, in the monasteries, societies of degenerate Benedictines ; Wil-
liam, nests of anti-Norman feeling. Lanfranc tried to reform the
1 Anglia Sacra, ii. 91, 194, Ac.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 371

abuses by drawing closer the rules of discipline ; William sought to
stifle the patriotic spirit by setting over them the tools of his strong
policy. But turbulent and worldly foreign abbots were not more likely
to improve the tone of religious society than rigorous reformers to
soften the asperities of national antipathy. The two forces did not
exactly neutralise one another, because they were neither equal nor
opposed in direction ; but the combination produced a result that
neither William nor Lanfranc could have calculated on.

For a long time the English spirit in the monasteries maintained Results of
itself against both tyranny and feform. They hated the Norman *'
invaders, but they had no inclination towards Rome, under whose
auspices the Norman invasion had succeeded. At the time, however,
that the Normans were taking deep root in England and becoming
amalgamated with the natives of the soil ; as their interests became in-
sular, and their policy influenced by their insular interests ; at this very
time also, the royal and the papal politics were diverging ; during the
whole period of the amalgamation the influence of the court of Borne
was declining, partly from the failure of goodwill in England, partly
from its own weakness.

As the Normans became Anglicised, and the royal policy, intern-
ally at least, English, the monasteries, still in opposition, lost their
distinctive characteristic of patriotism. As the State ceased to be
influenced by the court of Rome, the monks looked to the court of
Rome for sympathy and assistance. As the bishops and secular
clergy opposed themselves to Roman centralisation, the monasteries
became colonies of Roman partisans. Their sympathies and anti- Alienation
pathies were all in common with Rome, and their national spirit evapo- monastic
rated altogether to find a fitter and more permanent abode in the the^aticmai
necessary organism of the church. So long as the pope and the life
king were on the same side, the monks and the nation were opposed
to both alike ; when the pope and the king quarrelled, the nation
sided with the king, the monks with the pope ; hence the monasteries
became more papal as the State become more national, and the same
series of events made them less English without becoming more
Norman, and more papal without becoming more loyal. Matters
had reached this point in the latter years of Henry II.

The monastic cathedral was an institution almost peculiar to Origin of ti:e
England.1 The missionary bishop, himself a monk, accompanied Of cath&-s°s
by a staff of priests who were also monks, settled in the chief city of drals
a kingdom or province. He built his church ; his staff of missionary
monks became the clergy of that church ; the church itself was

1 There were, I believe, a few see, Lucius III. ordered that the
abroad : when the abbey of Monreale monastic order should be preserved,
in Sicily was made an archiepiscopal

B B 2

872

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

The newer
cathedrals
secular

Cathedral?
in the early
period of
monachism

called a monastery. As the mission work prospered the populations
of the larger towns were converted, and settled clergy who were not
monks undertook the spiritual charge of them. In time the over-
grown dioceses were divided. The principal church of the district
became the seat of a bishop, who might or might not be a monk, but
who found his episcopal chair placed for him in a church which was
of older foundation than itself, and which possessed a character that
he ought not and perhaps had not power to infringe. The longer
the subdivision of the original diocese was delayed, the more certain
was the new bishop to find himself surrounded by a staff of secular
city clergy. His cathedral continued to be an establishment of
secular clerks, and when the name and usage of canonical life came
into fashion they took, as a matter of course, the name of canons.
In this way it happened that, whilst the newly-founded sees of
Anglo-Saxon bishops were placed in secular churches, the original
settlements of the first missionary bishops retained a monastic
character. Canterbury was thus monastic, although Rochester and
London, founded as episcopal sees within seven years, were secular
cathedrals. Lindisfarne continued monastic, but York was a minster
of clerks. The mother church of Mercia was the monastery of
Diuma, but Lichfield and Hereford, and, as far as we know,
Leicester, Dorchester, and Worcester, were from the beginning in
the hands of clerks.1

During the early stages of monasticism, briefly characterised
above, this distinction was practically of little importance ; monks
and clerks lived together comfortably enough. Later on the secular
bishop in a monastic cathedral kept his clerks in his palace ; the
monks served the church ; the monastic bishop in a secular cathedral
lived as abbot in his own house and presided as bishop in the
church.2 In the further stage of the decline of monachism the
churches came almost entirely into the possession of the bishops'
clerks. As restored monachism developed its more aggressive
character, the monastic bishops in some cases edged out the secular
clergy from the cathedrals. At Worcester the bishop's chair and the
cathedral property were transferred from the college of S. Peter to

1 According to Rudburne, Ang. Sac.
i. 190, Birinus was a Benedictine monk,
and the church of Winchester originally
monastic ; but there is no proof of
either statement. The monastic order
became extinct there, according to the
same author, in 870.

* I believe that this is still the case
with the Greek, or at least the Rus-
sian bishops. They are necessarily
monks or celibates, and their staff is
composed of monks or celibates : but

the cathedrals are served by secular
clergy under an arcbpriest. The
Scoto-Irish system, in which the
bishop was an officer of the monastery
governed by an abbot, in whom, and
not in the bishop, the jurisdiction
was vested, is, of course, completely
different. But it is possible that the
monastic system, as it existed at Lin-
disfarne, was influenced by the Irish
connexion quite as much as by the
pattern of Canterbury.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 873

the monastery of S. Mary ; at Sherborne and Winchester the clerks
were compelled to embrace the monastic life or to retire from the
churches. At the time of the Conquest York, London, Hereford,
Selsey, Wells, Exeter, Eochester, Lichfield, Dorchester, and Thetford
were secular ; Winchester, Worcester, and Sherborne were monastic ;
the mother churches of the north and south had retained from the
beginning the monastic profession. The chair of Augustine had
never been removed from Canterbury, and Durham had inherited
the original character of Lindisfarne.1 In the former, as early as
the time of Bede,2 the monastic character of the church was based on
the authority of S. Gregory, and before the Conquest this was
understood to have been confirmed by a rescript of Pope Boniface
IV.3 Durham, according to its own historian Simeon, had been
continuously tenanted by a society of mixed character.

The cathedral church of Canterbury was not, however, a Monastic

.. ,, . , 0 , ,. , . ,, character of

monastery in the same sense as that of S. Augustine s in the same Christ
city ; the latter was founded for monastic purposes ; the other was terbury °an"
the mother church of the whole kingdom, its monastic characte*
being almost accidental. Hence, even in the strictest days of
regular discipline, it had contained many clergy who were net
monks, and many monks who were so only in name. As at the first
the essential character of its inmates was priestly, not monastic, so,
as time went on, their successors included both priests and monks.
It continued a monastery in name, but of its clergy some were and sketch of
some were not under monastic vows. Although the later monkish there
historians contended that all the archbishops up to the Conquest
were monks, it is certain from Bede and from the Chronicle that
they were not uniformly so. Under variations in the characters of
the rulers of the church, the double character of the archiepiscopal
familia may well have been maintained, so long as no jealousies
sprang up between the two constituents, and there was work enough
for both. It is not easy to say at what period the monastic
discipline at Christ Church became extinct. Early, however, in the
ninth century we find Archbishop Wulfred allowing his familia to
possess houses of their own within the monastery,4 and to dispose of
them by will among their brethren, a state of things quite incom-
patible with the rigour of Benedictine rule. The pontificate of
Ceolnoth (833 to 870) is the date fixed by the monastic historians
for the so-called usurpation of the cathedral by secular clerks.

1 Simeon of Durham (Twysden), privilege was granted on the under-

c. 49, 50. standing that the brethren were still

~ II . E. iv. 27. to frequent the refectory and the

3 W. Malmesb., G. P. i. c. 1464 (ed. dormitory : so that they were not yet

Migne). quite secularised.

1 Kemble, Codex Dipl. 200. Thi.s

874

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD 1.

Cathedral
system at
Canterbury
in the llth
century a
compromise
between
eecnlar and
rwfiilar pro-

policy of
inonachism

According to this story, the number of the monks having been
reduced by sickness to five, the archbishop ordered his chaplains and
the priests of the city to assist in divine service until he could
properly supply the vacancies.1 This the continuance of war pre-
vented him from doing, and ^Ethelred his successor was defeated in
a like purpose. After nearly two centuries of secular occupation
Archbishop ^Elfric succeeded in restoring the monks, but of these all
but four are said to have shared the martyrdom of S. JSlphege.2
From 1012 to 1070 a curious compromise between theory and fact
seems to have prevailed. The church was a monastery, and the
inmates bore the name of monks, but they did not keep the monastic
rule, and moreover assumed the titles of a secular chapter ; their
president was called a dean, the monks were also cathedral canons.3
The exact truth of these details it is of course impossible to test, but
they contain nothing that is either improbable or inconsistent with
ascertained facts. The subject has been rendered obscure both by
the partisans and by the enemies of monachism. The former have
never allowed the most positive evidence where it clashed with their
claims of superiority and antiquity ; the latter have been almost as
unscrupulous. But it would seem, on a careful consideration of
what is said and what is left unsaid in trustworthy records, that the
body which Lanfranc undertook to reform was in name monastic,
whether it became distinctively so under ^llfric or had borne the
title through various fluctuations of discipline from the earliest times.
It was unfortunately the policy of the monks and their advocates
to claim an original right to all monastic churches, and to aggrandise
themselves whenever they could with the occupation of those to
which they had not the original claim, on the ground of their
sanctity. In this way no prescription against them was allowed to
defeat their existing claims, and the shortest prescription in their
favour was pressed against the most just claim of the seculars. To
turn a church of clerks into a monastery was a merit of great
efficiency for the remission of sins, but to turn a monastery into a
secular church was an unheard-of impiety. On this principle
Worcester and Winchester changed their discipline under Oswald
and vEthelwold ; and although there were probably other reasons
for the changes introduced shortly before and after the Conquest,
the rule that a claim to superior ascetic sanctity entirely superseded
all the rights of property and prescription was acted upon, if not by
those Norman and Lotharingian bishops 4 who attempted to force

1 Chron. Sax. ad ann. 870, 995.
Oervase, c. 1643.

* Gervase, 1650, 1654.

' ' .Ethel no th munuc -j decixnus act

Christes cyrcan.' Chron. Sax. 1020.
Gervase, 1650.

4 Giso at Wells, Leofric at Exeter,
Thomas at York. W. Malmesh. O. P.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 375

the use of a common dormitory and refectory on their reluctant
canons, certainly by Gundulf in his reforms at Rochester and
William of S. Carileph at Durham.

It may be, however, that the measures of Lanfranc and his Lautranc-s
followers in the reform of the cathedrals were not altogether ofuu^theJ-
spontaneous. It is even possible that the original design was, not ^^5"
to turn the secular ones into monasteries, but to reduce the monastic Alexander!!,
cathedrals into the form common throughout the Western Church.1
At Winchester Bishop Walkelin made a vigorous effort to expel the
monks, which was only defeated by a papal letter forbidding him to
molest them.2 A similar letter 3 is extant, addressed to Lanfranc in
reference to changes reported to be in contemplation at Canterbury.
It was probably in consequence of this admonition that he organised
the cathedral establishment on the footing which it maintained down
to the dissolution. The alteration was quietly effected, the dean
becoming the prior and the rest of the unmarried canons accepting
the profession and position of monks.

Notwithstanding the great prestige of the monastic order in the origin of
early Anglo-Saxon Church, and in spite of the fact that the episcopal of monas'1'"
superintendence was exercised by men who were in many cases t(
monks, and in all imbued with extreme respect for the sanctity of
the institution, the real inherent antipathy between the two ideas inherent
developed very early. It is certain that in the Council of Hertford, between the
which was held by Archbishop Theodore in 673, to reduce to order ancTmouL-
the religious organisation of the southern kingdoms, this was a ticsystems
matter of consideration. The third canon of that assembly 4 provided,
' that as all monasteries are consecrated to God, it shall be lawful
for no bishop to disquiet them in anything, or to abstract any of
their property by violence.' It would seem from this that difficulties
had already arisen. It is a question whether any of the papal
exemptions which claim so early a date as the eighth century are
genuine. Bede, however, records a privilege of Pope Agatho to
Benedict Biscop,5 by which the monastery which he had built was
rendered safe and free for ever from any interference from without.
The monks of Peterborough alleged that they had a still earlier one, Character
in which Pope Vitalian exempted them from all subjection except to exemptions
the pope of Rome and the archbishop of Canterbury.6 Evesham

ii. c. 1548. Stubbs, in Twysden, 1708, Ancient Laws, &c. pp. 130, 134.

1709. Hunter's Ecclesiastical Docu- ' Eadmer, p. 10.

ments, pp. 17, 22. Foundation of - Anglia Sacra, i. 321.

Waltham Abbey, pref. p. xi. It is 3 Eadmer (ed. Selden), pp. 10, 11.

curious that in the only places in the 4 Bede, H. E. iv. 5.

Anglo-Saxon laws in which canons are 5 Historia Abbatum, c. 6, p. 320 (ed.

mentioned it is in connexion with the Hussey).

dormitory and refectory. Thorpe, * Chron. Sax. 657. Cf. 675.

876

MEMORIALS OF THE KEION OF RICHARD I.

Moderate
character of
early
genuine

exemption?

Later
exemptions

Attempt* of
the cathedral
monasteries
to acquire in-
dependence

possessed two letters of Pope Constantino conferring liberties of the
same character in language more grandiloquent than precise.1 The
famous exemptions of 3. Augustine's at Canterbury bear the names
of Popes Adeodatus and Agatho,2 but their authenticity was a matter
of question in the twelfth century. In all these cases except the
first there is great room for doubt. The chartulary of Chertsey *
contains a bull of Pope Agatho to S. Erkenwald, which, although
not free from suspicious characteristics, has greater claim to be
received as genuine. There is also a similar grant of Pope Constan-
tino to the monasteries of Bermondsey and Woking, which is found
in the Black Book of Peterborough,4 and which, as no monasteries
are known from other sources to have existed at those places before
the Conquest, is exposed to very slight presumption of forgery. The
two last-mentioned privileges are in strong contrast with the lavish
bestowals of independence that appear in the later and forged charters
of exemption. The convents are to elect their own abbots, but the
canonical power of the bishop of the diocese is not to be infringed :
the episcopal examination must be passed before the abbot can
receive benediction. The bishop is carefully excluded from inter-
fering with the administration of the monastic property. The
exemption was supposed to make the monastery independent of the
diocesan, but did not make it dependent on the court of Rome. It
is probable that to this extent, and no further, the independence of
the monasteries reached before the Conquest. After that event the
foreign system of exemptions was occasionally introduced ; the greater
abbeys, by either forged or genuine privileges, actually acquired
independence ; and the smaller ones, by affiliating themselves to one
of the new orders, such as those of Cluny or Citeaux, which were
dependent on a chief abbot or on a general chapter, and through
them on the pope alone, placed themselves and were frequently
strong enough to maintain themselves in a similar position. These
houses neither were in obedience to the bishops nor contributed to
their revenues in synodals and procurations, nor could the bishop
celebrate mass or hold synod in them without permission.

The cathedral monasteries looked with a jealous eye upon their
privileged sisters. In them the bishop claimed the place of abbot,
the right of presiding in the election of the officers, or of actually
nominating them, and the abbot's share in the management of the
estates. He was the persona of his cathedral, and through him as
tenant in chief of the Crown the tenure of the monastic property

1 Hist. Evesham (<•<!. Macray), pp.
171, 172.

z Klinlmm (ed. Hardwicke), pp. 244-
247.

' MS. Cotton. Vitellius A. xiii. fol.
I.
4 MS. Soc. Antiq. No. 60, folio 50.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 377

was defined. Such at least was the episcopal claim, confirmed by
the language of Lanfranc and Anselm.1 The monks, unable to
emancipate themselves by papal privilege, could only gain an
equality with the exempt monasteries either by occasionally in-
fluencing a pious bishop to defeat the rights of his successors, or by
procuring from the Crown charters of confirmation to the prior and
convent, instead of, as they had hitherto run, to the bishop and his
monks, the bishop and his family, or the bishop and his flock. The
vigilance of the prelates generally prevented the latter expedient
from succeeding, but advantage was frequently taken of the piety or
weakness of those who had been monks before their consecration to
effect the former. Hence the eagerness of the cathedral monasteries
to elect none but monks as their bishops. The see of Canterbury
was filled by monks for one hundred and twenty years, from
Lanfranc to Baldwin, with only two exceptions, William of Corbeuil,
who was a canon regular, and S. Thomas, whose monastic pro-
fession was assumed long after his consecration. During this time
the power of the prior and monks, to the exclusion of the archbishop,
increased with more or less rapidity. Lanfranc had either actually
separated the estates of the archbishop from those of the monks,
or had confirmed the separation. They appear under different heads
in the Domesday survey. Anselm bestowed on the prior and con-
vent the power of administering these separate estates and of The convent
despatching in common council all the business of the house ; in bury made
this was included the right of holding the manorial courts on their pe'ndent'b/"
estates.2 To him also the convent owed, besides liberal gifts in Anselm
money, furniture, and land, the settlement of the whole oblations of
the high altar,3 of which Lanfranc had retained half, and of the
xenia, or Easter and Christmas offerings from their manors, which
were settled on the cellarer for the use of the sick and strangers.4
By these sacrifices he left himself little more than a nominal
supremacy in the chapter, and renounced all interest in the revenues
of the house of which he was theoretically abbot. His object, how-
ever, was not to exempt the monks from the authority of the
archbishops, but, as is expressly stated by Eadmer, to prevent the
estates from falling into the king's hands during the vacancies of
the see.5 This policy was easily interpreted by the monks as freeing
them from subjection to either king or primate.

The example of Anselm was followed by fc>. Thomas,'' and Arch-

1 Lanfranc, Dt'cret<i,pi-eL Anselm, ' Gervase, 1478. Anselm appro-
cp. 78, p. 396 (ed. Migne). priated these Easter pence to the work

2 Eadmer, p. 108. of the church. Eadmer, 108.

3 Battely 'sOnfcrZmr?/, p. 103. MS. •"' Eadmer, 109.
Lambeth, 1212. Battely, App. p. 49. fl Battely, pp. 18. 1!).
Eadmer, 108.

878 MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

PHrflw* bishop Richard, who had been prior of Dover, a monastery in the
An-hbiitop gift and under the dominion of the cathedral. Both of these had
surrendered the oblations of the church, which during the time of
Richard included the immense treasures offered at the tomb of his
predecessor. Richard had further appropriated four churches, with
their dependent chapels, ' to the uses of the almonry. One privilege,
however, seems to have been retained by the archbishops, the right
J'--\ •;• of presenting to the churches on the estates of the convent. This
was supposed by the monks to be a usurpation of Archbishop

Anting to* Theobald ; but it is by no means certain that the right had ever been
UM-'cwnven- exercised by the convent without the nomination of the archbishop.
toai estates g Thomas retained the presentations in his own hands,2 and
although Richard, in the first year of his consecration, professed to
restore them, Gervase the chronicler admits that the restoration was
defeated by the intrigues of the archbishop's clerks, and that the
convent did not enjoy its rights.

Exaggerated It is no wonder that under these circumstances, and owing to
convent e the frequent long absences of the archbishops, the obedience formerly
due to them came to be looked upon as a voluntary thing. The claim
of the convent to elect their head was put forward on every occasion,
and yet when the archbishop was elected he was hardly recognised
as a member of his own church. Although he was the rector and
persona of the cathedral, the prior and monks claimed to be the
church of Canterbury. To the convent, according to their absurd
interpretation of the oath of profession, every newly-consecrated
bishop swore fidelity ; the archbishop was little more than their
minister and mouthpiece, and when his voice was not in accord with
theirs he was directly disowned. The martyrdom of S. Thomas,
which, if it was an offering at all, was certainly an offering for the
immunities of the whole of the clergy, was looked on as the redemp-
tion of the church of Canterbury ; the church of Canterbury was the
mother church of England, a declaration which, however true in one
sense, was pressed now into a meaning that was false both in law
and in fact.

Extrova- The influx of wealth produced a corresponding lavish and luxu-

moukn° nous outlay. The hospitality of the convent became famous in all

the Western Church, from the crowds of pilgrims who returned from

the shrine of the martyr. The internal expenditure was also

immense. The refectory was the scene of the most abundant and

1 He also restored the xenia, which The first three had been appropriated

must have been kept back by the before, and were really restored by

archbishop since Theobald's time. Richard.

Oerv. 1675. The churches were * W. Fitz-Htephen, ed. Giles, p. 208.

Eynesford, Eastry, Monkton, and Gerv. 16C7, 1675. See also p. 532,

Mepeham. Somner, 112. Battely, 97. vol. R. S.

MEMORIALS OF THE EEIGN OF RICHARD I. 379

tasteful feasting. Seventeen dishes were served up at the prior's
table.1 The servants and equipages of a hundred and forty brethren 2
were numerous and splendid. The monastery had become a little
town, in which the prior was supreme both temporally and spiritually.
The example of Canterbury was followed by some of the other
cathedral monasteries, and the struggle recorded in the following
pages was the result of an attempt of the archbishop and bishops to
remedy the evils and discomforts of such a relation.

The first tokens of the strife may be discovered in the history of struggle
the pontificate of Theobald, in 1150.3 At that time the revenues of Archbishop
the convent were so much diminished by the demands of hospitality Bn<fthe
and by the ravages of war that the prior restored to the archbishop conven<
the administration of the conventual property, which had been
granted by Anselm, begging him to manage it, and to maintain the
brethren until better times came. Theobald began by exercising
severe economy ; he closed the convent against all but the poorest
guests, and fed the monks, to their great disgust, on coarse bread
and vegetables, sometimes allowing only one loaf to two. The
monastic temperament would endure none but voluntary fasting ;
speedy repentance followed the exercise of stricter discipline, and the
archbishop was roundly charged with nursing his own estates at the
expense of his flock. Theobald, who had undertaken the stewardship
with great reluctance, was justly provoked at this absurd accusation,
and refused to listen to the complaint of the prior ; the convent
appealed to Home ; the archbishop closed the monastery and re-
strained the monks from egress, stopped divine service, seized the
prior's horses, carried off the charters of the church, and arrested
and imprisoned the brethren who had been chosen to prosecute the
appeal. Adding insult to injury, he compared the monks to dogs.
The mediation of the prelates was shortly afterwards successful in
inducing the convent to renounce the appeal and the archbishop to

1 Giraldus, Ang. Sacr. ii. 480. records two other quarrels between the

2 Gervase, 1654. The number of archbishop and the convent, one in
monks expelled in 1207 was sixty-four the time of William of Corbeuil, about
(John of Oxenedes, ad annum) ; thir- the church of Dover ; and a second,
teen more were sick ; there were there- between Theobald and Prior Jeremiah,
fore not more than seventy-seven at whom he compelled to resign. Both,
that time ; at the dissolution there no doubt, helped to embitter the feel-
were fifty-three. Of the number of ing between the parties, but they have
servants it is difficult to form an idea. no particular bearing on the present
The cellarer in 1322 had thirty-eight controversy. Peter of Blois (ep. 216)
servants under him ; and the chamber- states that there had been a continual
lain and sacrist had large numbers of hostility of the monks to the arch-
people employed as tailors, furriers, bishop since Anselm's time : the days
launderers, &c., and in the service of of Thomas not excepted : one of the
the church. See Somner, pp. 108, 109 ; brethren refers to the ill will shown by
and Appendix 35, vol. R. S. the convent to the martyr in No.

8 Gervase, 1367-1369. Gervase cclxviii.

880

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

Character of
ArcbbUhop
Baldwin

Hi- error-
of temper

restore the estates. He insisted, however, on the resignation of the
prior, which he effected after three years' litigation, the contest
being a drawn game, except so far as his personal enmity to the
prior was gratified by the result.

Archbishop Baldwin, whose misfortune it was to renew the
struggle after the position of the monks had been strengthened and
their resources increased during the pontificates of Thomas and
Richard, was a man of singular sanctity, courage, and honesty. He
was one of the most distinguished scholars of his time, and has left
behind him works which attest his proficiency in the studies of the
day.1 According to Giraldus Cambrensis,8 who knew him well,
although it is not easy to say how far he speaks the truth, he was
an austere, melancholy man, slow to anger and temperate in the
show of it, wanting in severity and firmness. Alexander Llewelyn,
the cross-bearer of the martyr, used to say of the three archbishops
whom he had known that when they came to town the first place
S. Thomas visited was the court ; Richard, the grange ; Baldwin, the
church. He was, in fact, a Cistercian of the best sort, a man who
lived but little for the world, and that to make it better. A certain
infirmity of purpose may be traced in his career, for which the rapid
changes which attended his promotion may account, if they cannot
excuse it. He adapted himself perhaps too easily to the quickly
changing circumstances of his life, and so failed to carry out in his
higher position the hopes and promise which had led to his attaining
it. According to Giraldus, his friend, as well as to Urban III., his
bitter enemy, he was more zealous as a monk than as an abbot, as
an abbot than as bishop, as bishop than as archbishop. In the
mouth of Urban this was almost praise. We, judging him by a
better standard, may admire the honesty and clearsightedness in
which, as an abbot, he chose to perform the duty of an abbot rather
than to humour the prejudices of his monks ; and, when he became
archbishop, tried to do his duty as an archbishop, instead of playing
into the hands of the monastic party, a course which would have
insured him a much more quiet life, and, considering the circum-
stances of his death, might have entitled him to canonisation. The
errors of temper, harshness, arbitrary severity, and want of tact, of
which he cannot be acquitted on the evidence of the letters (in vol.
R. S.), are not perhaps really inconsistent with the character drawn
of him by Giraldus. They seem to be exactly the faults into which

1 Walter Map, De Nugis Curialium,
etl. Wright, p. '20. His works are
published in the fifth volume of the
Bibliotheca Patr. Cistorciensium, A.H.
1662. There lire a penitential and a

volume of sermons by Baldwin in the
library at Lambeth.

1 Gir. Camb., Anglia Sacra, ii. 429,
523. Oervase, 1478.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 381

an unworldly man would be hurried by the influence of unscrupulous
and interested advisers.

To Baldwin, as a Cistercian, as a scholar, and as an archbishop, The *t:itc ot
the state of his cathedral monastery was extremely offensive. The church
luxury and independence of the monks were opposed to all his BaMiwiTf to
notions of monastic sanctity : his own claims as abbot, so highly
estimated under the Cistercian rule, were practically repudiated.
The once famous learning of the school of Canterbury was now
represented only by Nigel Wireker the poet and Gervase the
chronicler. The archbishop felt himself to be an unwelcome
stranger in his own house ; the sense of personal dislike was added
to determine his feelings towards the monks ; he knew that he had
been forced upon them when they would rather have chosen Theobald
of Cluny ' or Odo of Battle.2

Still, it may be doubted whether he would have attempted any The iusti?a-
measure for their humiliation if it had not been for the suggestions Ms'depen-
of the clerks, scholars, and statesmen who surrounded him in his d
new position. The former complained that in a monastic cathedral
the archbishop had no means of rewarding his faithful servants with
places of dignity aud profit. All he could do for them was to enrich
them with church livings, diverting the means appropriated to the
cure of souls, and placing them in positions which they had neither
tastes nor time to fill as the laws of the church required. The
scholars,3 such as Peter of Blois and Joseph of Exeter, Baldwin's Theiu-
kinsman,4 could find ample room for regret that the great revenues
should be spent on idle and luxurious monks, which might maintain
a university of able and useful students ; with such a plea Baldwin
himself had much sympathy, and the poverty of the infant univer-
sities presented a disagreeable contrast to the riches of the
monasteries. But the statesmen, the court bishops, and clerical
lawyers were the bitterest enemies of the monks, whom they
regarded as the avowed maintainers of an alien jurisdiction in the
country, as the greatest supporters of dangerous and disreputable
immunities, and as insurmountable obstacles to an equal and
uniform administration of justice. Both king and church were from
time to time exasperated by the claim of the monks to elect the
primate, a claim which they looked upon as a dangerous innovation,
and which, if granted, might lead to a repetition of the miseries of
the struggle between Henry and Thomas. Urged by these, the

1 Benedict. Peterb. ad 1184. Trojan War. Baldwin intended him

- Gervase, 1466. to be the poet of the third Crusade.

3 Cf. No. clxx. p. 146, vol. R. S. ; Gir. Camb., Ang. Sacra, ii. 492. He
and Gervase, 1478. is mentioned once in No. ccxlviii.

4 The author of the lost Antioclieis p. 230, as in correspondence with the
and of the extant Uixtory of the dean of Rheims.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD L

Opposite
accounts of
Baldwin's
design

Fears of the
monks

archbishop began his attack upon the convent, and, advised by these,
he conducted his approaches by those crooked ways in which a man
cannot walk at once honestly and successfully.1

If we are to accept the account given by Baldwin and his
adherents, his intention was only to build a large collegiate church,
such as had been projected by 8. Anselin and 8. Thomas, in honour
of 8. Stephen and 8. Thomas, to be tenanted by men of learning,
usefulness, and distinction. For the maintenance of this establish-
ment sufficient could be easily spared from the archiepiscopal
property if it were freed from the claims by which the liberality or
piety of the series of monks who had filled the see had impoverished
it for the enrichment of the convent. The monks, on the other
hand, declared that this foundation was intended to supplant their
own church, as the mother church of England. It was to be built
and endowed out of their estates ; its canons were to be the bishops,
who already claimed a voice in the election of the primate ; that
voice would be heard in exclusion of the convent. The archbishop,
backed by the king, would have supreme jurisdiction ; he would be
pope and the suffragans his cardinals ; beyond him no appeal would
be suffered to go ; not only would the monasteries lose their money >

Obedien-
tiaries in
1187.

Treasurers,
1187,
p. 60.

' It may be as well to give here in
a note, before entering upon the
chronological sketch of the struggle, a
list of the monks who were engaged in
the dispute with Baldwin, 1187-1189
(page references are to vol. in R.S.) : —
Honorius, prior, 1186-1188.
Geoffrey, subprior, 1180-1191.
Alan, third prior.
Robert, sacrist,
Hervey, cellarer,
Simon, chamberlain,
Ralph, almoner, d. 1188.
Roger Norreys,
John of Boching,
Ralph of Orpington.
Symon, treasurer, 1187, p. 55.
Felix, cellarer, 1189, p. 299 ; deposed,

1191 ; sacrist, before 1197 ; prior of

Dover, 1197.

Osbert de Bristo, prior, 1190.
John de Bremble, probably third prior

until 1188. See No. ccxxxii. pp. 298,

308.

Edmund, \

Humfrey, [Died at Rome

Haymo de Thanet, in 1188

Symon, )

Gervase, sacrist in 1193, p. 315.
Nigel ' Wireker,' pp. 315, 317.
William, precentor in 1198, pp. 258,

311.

Hervey, precentor in 118J.
Alexander of Dover,

pp. 94, 308,
Henry, pp. 226, 230, Employed
Jonas, p. 271, f abroad.

Elias, p. 278,
R., p. 226, Ac.
Willelmus Ascelinus,

p. 311, Partisans

Robertus Medicus, p. • of Roger

312, Norreys.

Walter de Ba, p. 169.
R., chaplain to S. Thomas.
— , chaplain to S. Thomas.
R. de Tumba, p. 308.
0. de Tumba, p. 314.
R. de Cripta, p. 298.
Helyas Magnus, p. 315.
Aaron, pp. 67, 315, 317.
Isaac, pp. 311, 317.
James, p. 315.
Walter de Stura, p. 311.
R. rle Eastry, p. 313.
Zacharias, p. 312.
Benjamin, p. 312.
Lodovicus, p. 312.
Badewinus, p. 311.
Ralph de Harundel, p. 311.
Symon of Dover, p. 67.
John of Dover, p. 430. Abbot of

Battle, 1200-1213.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 388

but their stay and support, their connexion with Eome would be cut
off, recourse to the Holy See would be forbidden, and a schism in the
Western Church would follow. It is curious to note how nearly
their instincts led them to the results which four centuries later did
follow the abolition of the monastic order in England.

The first measure taken by the archbishop was to procure a letter
from the pope, Lucius III.,1 empowering him to reclaim the pos- Baldwin
sessions alienated from the see by his predecessor. This licence was pa^'uic
necessary, because the alienations in question had been confirmed by ^
Alexander III., and by Lucius himself.2 It was uncertain how far j^ gee'ty of
such a permission would be allowed to be valid in opposition to the
papal privileges which might be adduced by the convent ; but there
could be no doubt that if the archbishop had proceeded without it
he would have put himself out of court at once. Of these alienated
possessions the principal ones were the oblations of the church,
which canonically belonged to the archbishop,3 and the four churches
appropriated to the almonry, Monkton, Eastry, Mepeham, and
Eynesford, and these had been confirmed to the convent by the Holy
See. The alienations which had not been so confirmed the archbishop
could reclaim with no risk of coming in direct conflict with the
court of Eome. His measures would probably be appealed against,
but when the appeal was once admitted, the price of justice at Eome
was notorious, and the longest purse, the weightiest influence, or the
most determined pertinacity might reckon on victory.

Armed with this permission, Baldwin, on the 15th of December, He seizes
1185, the first anniversary of his enthronement, came to Canterbury
and confiscated the xenia.4 It is probable that the news of the
death of the pope, which occurred at Verona on the 24th of November,
reached England about this time, and that for that reason the arch-
bishop did not proceed at once to seize the churches of the almonry.
His agents at Verona, however, lost no time in obtaining the renewal
of the licence from Urban III.5 This was issued on the 19th of
December, and on the 25th of January 1186, the archbishop's clerks, and the

...... churches of

by virtue of his presentations, took possession of the churches of theaimoury
Monkton and Eastry. They borrowed the keys, says Gervase,6
pretending that they wished to hear the gospel, and fraudulently
inducted the new incumbents. At the same time certain of the vills
of the convent were seized and committed to lay stewards under
the archbishop's authority.

The monks, immediately on the receipt of this news, appealed to
Eome against the archbishop, who in consequence proceeded to take

1 No. i. 2 Battely's Canterbury, p. 97, and vol. R. S. p. 5.

s Can. Apost. xl. 4 Gervase, 1478.

5 No. ii. 6 Gervase, 1478.

884

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

The monk*
appeal, and
afterwards
withdraw
the appeal

Haymo
carries t lie
appeal to
the pope

Prior Hono-
rias suc-
ceed* Alan

BaMwin
proposes to
found a
college of se-
cnlar clergy

at Haking-
ton, near
Canterbury

possession of all the estates of the church. As in Theobald's time,
a mediation was proposed and accepted. The archbishop restored
the estates, and the convent renounced the appeal. Baldwin
retained, however, both the xenia and the disputed churches, M he
had a right to do, on the renunciation of the appeal, and proceeded
to bestow the latter on some of those influential ecclesiastics whose
interest he was anxious to secure either at home or abroad.
Eynesford he gave to John of Poictiers, now archbishop of Lyons.1
The convent were not unanimous in their submission ; one monk,
Haymo of Thanet, refused to join in the compromise, and carried the
appeal (contrary to the good faith of the convent), first by letter and
then in person, to Pope Urban.

The next step the archbishop took was, pursuant to the policy of
Theobald, to get rid of the prior and substitute a creature of his own.
Alan was made abbot of Tewkesbury,2 and to maintain the balance
of justice Robert of Hastings, Baldwin's chief supporter among the
monks, was rewarded with the abbacy of Chester. Honorius, the
cellarer of Christ Church, who had been chaplain to the archbishop,
was elected to succeed Alan.3 This appointment is said to have been
made at the petition of the convent, who perhaps knew Honorius
better than the archbishop did, the latter accepting him as a man
who would easily be amenable to his influence. This was done on
the 18th of July.

Matters being now ripe for futher progress, a letter was issued to
the clergy and people of England, instituting a brotherhood for
collecting contributions towards the building of a new collegiate
church, to be dedicated to the martyrs Stephen and Thomas.4 In
confirmation of this design letters were produced from the pope,
which had been granted to the earnest petitions of the bishops and
archbishop.5 One of these, which was published in November,
confirmed the foundation of the college ; another readjusted the
oblations of Christ Church, giving one quarter to the monks,
another to the poor, another to the fabric of the cathedral, and the
remainder to the archbishop, to be used at his pleasure.

During the last week of November, Baldwin and his clerks came
down to Canterbury, intending to install his new foundation for a
time in the parish church of S. Stephen at Hakington, the northern
suburb of Canterbury, about three furlongs from the cathedral. If

1 John of Poictiers was a native of
Canterbury. Walter Map, De Nugis
Curialium, p. 70.

1 Received benediction June 15.
Oervase, 1480.

* Alan of Tewkesbury ; ep. ziv.

Gervase, 1480.

4 No. viii. This expedient for
raising funds was not unusual. See
Ann. Winton. (ed. Luard), p. 78, and
Du Cange, Confratr'ui.

* Nos. vi., dlx , dlxi.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 385

we are to credit Gervase ' the college was already incorporated. It His piau for
was to consist of sixty or seventy prebendaries : one stall was assigned
to the king, and one to each of the confederate bishops, who were
each to endow and appoint his prebendary and vicar. Every incum-
bent of a church in the gift of the archbishop was to be a canon, and
this included also all the churches properly in the gift of the convent.
By a singular coincidence it happened that on the night of the feast vision of
of S. Catherine a young monk, named Andrew John, saw a wonderful jXi^
vision. The venerated form of S. Thomas appeared to him, bade him
rise from his pallet and follow him from the dormitory into the choir,
and through the choir into an adjacent tower. There the saint showed
him a huge Catherine wheel, shooting out blue flames. Having
withdrawn a little way, he saw the archbishop approach. He took
three swords, and having leaned upon each to try whether it would
bend, chose one of them, and summoned the prior Honorius. ' I wish,'
said Baldwin, ' to destroy this new work [the unfinished cathedral],
and for this purpose I have made this wheel, but without you I can-
not move it.' The prior reluctantly complied, and other monks were
called to help. Andrew John was now terribly frightened, and
implored the saint to interfere. S. Thomas drew his sword, a blade
of inconceivable brightness, inscribed with letters of gold, at the first
sight of which the archbishop and his satellites vanished. He then
delivered the sword to Andrew, showing him the inscription, ' Gladius
beati Petri apostoli,' and bade him give it to the prior, who shpuld
smite with it and destroy the Catherine wheel. The monk now
awoke, but the dream was thrice repeated before he ventured to tell
it to the prior, who immediately saw in the wheel the archbishop's
new college, and in the sword of S. Peter the ready weapon of appeal
to Rome. About the same time another of the brethren saw in a
vision the archbishop trying to cut off S. Thomas's head, and losing
his mitre in the attempt.

This strange vision, whether true or fictitious, was believed by the second ap-
brethren, and had the effect of settling prior Honorius in his fidelity.2 convent 'e
On the 8th of December the convent united in a second appeal, which
was announced to Baldwin on the 14th at Gillingham, by Gervase
the historian, who fixed the date of appeal for the following Mid -Lent
Sunday.3 The archbishop received Gervase with calmness and
allowed the appeal. On the 16th, however, he came to Canterbury,
and on the next day proceeded to Hakington, where he said mass, and
instituted his canons in spite of the opposition of the convent.
Returning to Christ Church the same day, he suspended the prior

1 Gervase, 1481.

2 There are numerous references to this vision in the letters (vol. R. S.) ;
especially Nos. Ixix., ccxciv. 3 Gerv. 1484. No. ix.

c c

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

The prior
goes to Italy

The two
parties uml
their allies

The Ciater-
cians support
Baldwin, the
Cluuiacs the
convent

and the appellant brethren, closed the monastery, and ordered the
monks on their obedience to remain within.1 Then, as a mark of his
profound displeasure, he went to keep Christmas at Otford, thereby
laying his cathedral open to an unheard-of insult, for on Christmas eve
two papal legates, Hugh of Nunant and Cardinal Octavian, neither of
them a bishop, were suffered to enter the church with their mitres on
and their crosses erect. The prior, regardless of the prohibition, fled
from Canterbury immediately after Baldwin's departure, and, crossing
the straits, landed on the 22nd in Flanders,3 whence he pursued his
way to Verona.

The contest was now to begin in earnest, and each party looked
round for supporters, both at home and abroad. The state of Europe
was such that neither had any difficulty in finding patrons. Baldwin
was strong in the assistance of Henry, who was believed to have
suggested the tactics of the archbishop, and the convent consequently
betook themselves to solicit the friendship of those who openly or
secretly wished to embarrass the king. All who had shown
sympathy with S. Thomas during his life, or reverence for him
after his death, were claimed as friends by the convent. Philip
of Fiance and Philip of Flanders were drawn to this side either
by dislike to the king or by duty to the martyr. The Emperor
Frederick was appealed to by the convent ; 3 Henry the Lion, as the
king's son-in-law, was favourable to the archbishop, and his ex-
ample was followed by the king and queen of Sicily.4 The whole
Cistercian order, at home and abroad, espoused the party of Baldwin
from principle and inclination ; and the whole order of Cluny, at
home and abroad, undertook the defence of the convent, to which
they were attached by their earliest traditions. Thus the monastic
party in England was itself divided, and whilst the convents of
Faversham, Reading, and Lewes were found among the willing
agents of the monks, those of Boxley and Robertsbridge were always
ready to defeat any step injurious to the archbishop. Of the greater
monasteries, those of Peterborough, Battle, and Tewkesbury were
ruled by abbots who had been priors of Canterbury, and Eveaham
by a Cluniac monk. S. Augustine's, hating impartially both the
archbishop and the convent, stood aloof from the strife. In France
the abbeys of S. Bertin and Cluny afforded a home to the exiles
and provisions to the messengers of the convent. One Cistercian
monk, Peter, who had been abbot of Citeaux, and was now bishop of
Arras, offered a lukewarm support to the monks, but actually played
into the hands of Baldwin. Ralph de Serra (Sarr in Thanet), dean
of Rheims, who had been a friend of S. Thomas, and was personally

1 Gervase 1485.
1 No. xix.

1 No. xi.

4 No. clxxxiii.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 387

attached to the convent, was their most zealous supporter among
the secular clergy in France.

In the college of cardinals the same differences prevailed. Of Parties
the cardinal bishops, Henry of Albano, who had been abbot of
Clairvaux when Baldwin was abbot of Ford, undertook the defence
of his friend ; he was supported by Cardinal Albert, the chancellor,
who is also claimed by the Cistercians,1 and who had known the
king of England in former years, and by the cardinal deacon
Octavian. On the other hand, Theobald, bishop of Ostia and dean
of the Sacred College, had been abbot of Cluny, and also a candidate
for the see of Canterbury when Baldwin was elected ; 2 both good
reasons for supporting the monks. Among the less eminent
cardinals who were glad to pursue the ordinary policy of the papacy
by weakening the authority of the bishops and supporting the
demand of the monks, the latter found great favour. Of these were
William of Champagne, archbishop of Kheims, who, though not
resident, had influential agents at Verona ; Gratian, the cardinal
of SS. Cosrnas and Damian, the friend of S. Thomas, who called
him the Son of Grace, and the mortal enemy of Henry, who had
contemned his mediation in 1169 ; Cardinal Hyacinth, who after-
wards became Celestine III. ; the French cardinals, Melior and
Ralph Nigel ; Gerard Allucingoli, nephew of Lucius III. ; Peter of
Piacenza, Soffred of S. Mary in Via Lata ; and John of Anagni,
cardinal priest of S. Mark, to whose family was attached a young
ecclesiastic, his kinsman, whose friendship gained at this time was
fraught with great issues both to the convent and to their country ;
Lothario 3 dei Conti di Segni, afterwards Pope Innocent III. Last,
if not least, Urban III., or Pope Turban as the imperialists called
him, once archdeacon of Bourges, and an ally of S. Thomas.4
threw himself with his characteristic violence into the party opposed
to Baldwin.

The archbishop took up his position with the best advice. He Position of
found himself backed by the majority of the bishops at home. Geof- at"homeOIX
frey of Ely,5 the archidiabolus of S. Thomas, was ready to depose
that in that loving intercourse which they had enjoyed the departed
saint had often spoken of his design of building a church in honour

1 Ciaconius. been able to discover them. There is

2 Benedict Peterb. ad ann. 1184. so great an a priori probability that

3 P. 68, vol. B. S. S. Thomas, who had a great venera-

4 Conrad of Ursperg, p. cccxi. (ed. tion for S. Stephen, had some such
1540.) Herb. Bosham, vii. 1. plan, that Geoffrey might safely assert

5 No. xxiii. It is not improbable it, whether true or not. Peter of
that there may be some traces of a Blois tells an even more circumstantial
design of this sort on the part of story of S. Anselm's wish to do the
S. Anselm and S. Thomas in their same. Ep. 216. (Appendix, vol. R. S.
different lives ; I have not, however, No. dlxxi.)

c c 2

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN <>K RICHARD I.

Opinion of
3. Hugh

The king t
ministers

The arch-
btobop tries
to oanrp the
management
of the
estates of
the convrnt

Jfenry II.
visit* Can-
terbury

of S. Stephen. Hugh of Nunant, the elect of Coventry, nephew of
Arnulf of Lisieux,1 the inheritor of the diplomatic abilities and
courtly habits of a long race of astute Norman prelates, and the inveter-
ate enemy of monachism, was prepared to go any lengths of violence
in the same direction. John the Chantor, bishop of Exeter, was
bound, both as an Exeter man and as a newly consecrated bishop, to
take the side of his townsman and primate. The bishop of Norwich,
John of Oxford, needed no persuasion to take up arms against his old
enemies. Gilbert of Rochester was the near kinsman of the king's
jnsticiar, and at constant war with the monks of his own church.
Seffrid of Chichester and Reginald of Bath, with a view probably to
future elections, took the opposite side. Hugh of Lincoln stood
aloof, and, according to his biographer, faithfully remonstrated with
Baldwin, explaining the difficulties and dangers of the course he was
beginning, so clearly and sensibly that the result almost entitled him
to the reputation of a prophet.9

Of the king's ministers, Ranulf Glanviil professed attachment to
the convent, but Hubert Walter, his nephew, was designated for
one of the new prebends, as were also Richard FitzNeal, the king's
treasurer, and several others who rose to eminence in the following
reigns, among whom were William of S. Mere 1'Eglise, afterwards
bishop of London ; Henry of Northampton, canon of S. Paul's ; and
Ralph of S. Martin, the persecutor of the convent under John.3

Before sending his representatives to Rome to answer the prior,
the archbishop took a step towards recovering the administration of
the conventual estates. He forbade the tenants to pay rent to the
monks, and, having summoned three of the brethren, presented them
with a commission to manage the affairs of the house during the
absence of the prior."1 The convent refused to recognise the autho-
rity, and Baldwin, having pleaded the precedent of Theobald, not
feeling very sure of his ground, waived his claim/ The king, who
had spent Christmas at Guildford and was now going abroad, about
this time sent, at the archbishop's request, the bishops of Norwich
and Worcester, with Hugh of Nunant,6 to propose an arbitration ; but
this was rejected by the subprior Geoffrey, a man of great firmness
and much practical ability, who two days afterwards had an inter-
view with the king at Chilham, and left him favourably impressed

1 Hugh was nephew to Arnulf,
bishop of Lisieux, and John FitzHar-
douin, bishop of Seez, and adminis-
trator of Rochester : grand-nephew of
John, bishop of Lisieuz. See Epist.
Arnulfi, pp. 97, 121, 137, Ac. (ed.
Migne) ; and Ord. Vital, zi. 31, xii. 35.
Hugh was legate of the Apostolic See

for Ireland in 1186.

* Magna Vita S. Hugonis (ed.
Dimock, pp. 133 136).

* Foedera, i. 99. Foss's Judges, i.
418.

4 NOR. Ixxxiv. Ixxxv.

5 Qervase, 1486.

* No. zcix.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 389

with his eloquence and moderation. On the llth of February, 1187,
Henry came in person to Christ Church, and prayed the monks to
renounce the appeal and accept an arbitration. This failing, he
addressed himself to Baldwin, with whom he was acting in concert.
'Let the archbishop remove the suspension of the offending monks ; the
king was in despair at losing so many valuable intercessors.' The
archbishop insisted on a confession to be made in the presence of
witnesses ; the convent pleaded the privilege by which strangers
were forbidden to be present on such an occasion. The archbishop,
however, granted a general absolution before he left.

He now despatched his agents to Verona : Peter of Blois, arch- Baldwin
deacon of Bath, and William of S. Faith (sans faith, according to ^Verona',13
the convent), precentor of Wells. He also changed the site of his ^slteoP3
new church, from the churchyard of Hakington to the vacant space his colleee
in front of S. Dunstan's church, now known as S. Thomas's hill.1
The foundations were begun on the 18th of February, a day marked
by the heaviest hailstorm ever known in Kent.

The prior and his companions, well furnished with letters of Honoriusat
introduction, had now reached Verona, and found the pope already toinsTinaii-
active in their behalf. He had listened favourably to the first appeal, ^toration
and before the arrival of the prior, on the 19th of January, had
issued a mandate for the restoration of Eastry and Monkton, the
execution of which was committed to the bishop of Lincoln and the
abbots of Boxley and S. Augustine's.2 As, however, this appeal had
been formally renounced, these letters were not brought forward in
the controversy. Notwithstanding the absence of Theobald of Ostia,3
Honorius obtained an audience of the pope, and on the 1st of March,
a week before the term of the appeal, was able to send papal letters
to England ordering the archbishop to remove his suspension, and
the abbots of Battle, Faversham and S. Augustine's to enforce
compliance.4 As the archbishop's agents had not arrived on Mid-Lent
Sunday, Urban adjourned the hearing of the cause to the 10th of
April, in the meanwhile granting several privileges to the prior, and

1 Gervase, 1491 ; Somner, p. 47; and the convent and the heirs of William

No. dlv. vol. R. S. Although the new FitzRalph, the original donor. This

site was in the parish of S. Dunstan, ended in Archbishop Richard's time,

the college continued to be called that He gave it to Gentilis, a nephew of

of Hakington. Alexander III., to revert on his death

- Nos. iii. v. The churches of to the almonry. Gentilis died shortly

Eynesford and Mepelmm are not before Richard, who then confirmed

mentioned in this letter. Mepeham the appropriation.— Fragment of a

was in fact held by Master Virgil, to chartulary of the almonry, Lambeth

whom Archbishop Richard had given Charters, vol. xiii. p. 1, No. 15, and

it at the request of Alexander III., Bodl. MS. Tanner, xviii.

and whose rights he had reserved in 3 No. xxxiv.

the act of appropriation. Eynesford 4 Nos. xxvi. xxvii.
had been long in litigation between

MEMORIALS OK THE RKIGN OF RICHARD I.

contempt ol
the papal

nmiuUtr

He builds
a wooden
ehapel

The pope
issues two
new man-
date*

Bald will

:i'.';iin COII-

tcmng tbc

especially vesting the whole of the oblations of the church in the
hands of the convent.

Baldwin received the letters ordering the removal of the prior's
suspension on the 25th of March, at Otford ; he took no further
notice of them, but, by way of showing his contempt for the convent,
consecrated, at S. Paul's in London on the following day, the chrism
for the diocese of Canterbury.1 The abbot of Battle executed hia
commission on the llth of April,2 declaring the sentence against the
prior and monks to be invalid ; the other points of the mandate,
which proceeded to enjoin the restoration of the status quo ante
appellationem, he was afraid to proceed with, ;vnd referred them
back to the pope. On the 14th3 the archbishop's clerks appealed to
the pope against the commissioners, and Baldwin replied to the
attack by confining to the monastery Ralph of Orpington and John
of Boching, the managers of the estates, and by building a chapel
of wood, eighty feet in length, on the chosen site.

This was duly reported to the pope, who, on the 9th of May, the
representatives of Baldwin having not yet appeared, addressed two
peremptory letters 4 to the archbishop, in the first of which he
forbade him to proceed with his buildings, and in the second ordered
him to restore the property of the convent. He also wrote to the
prelates of England abolishing the new brotherhood, and to the
abbots of Battle, Faversham and S. Augustine's, to compel Baldwin
to restitution.5 Honorius and his party, having succeeded so well,
prepared to return home, leaving the cause in the hands of Master
Pillius, an eminent advocate, with injunctions to watch the arrival
and the machinations of the archbishop's agents. The letters were
sent forward by Haymo of Thanet, the original appellant.6 Brothers
Humfrey and Edmund prepared to accompany the prior.7

The apostolic mandates were served on the archbishop as he was
going on a legatine visit to Wales,8 the first at Bredon, on June 10th,
and the second at Shrewsbury, on the 28rd, by brothers Symon and
Aaron. To both he returned answer in writing, ' We have seen the
pope's mandates, and what we have to do thereupon we will do.'
His practical reply was to press on the building ; the papal letter
had miraculous power to turn the wooden edifice to stone ; 9 the
canons began to build their houses, and took upon themselves the
responsibility of proceeding with the church. John of Boching and
Ralph of Orpington were now excommunicated, and immediately

1 No. xxxiii. Oerv. 1493. ' Nos. liii. liv.

2 No. xxviii. Gerv. 1494. • Not to be confounded with bis
1 Gerv. 1494. expedition to Wales in the following
4 Nos. xl. xlii. year on the business of the Crusade.

• Nos. xli. xliii. » No. Ixvi.

• Gerv. 1497. Nos. Ixx. Ixxix.

MEMOKIALS OF THE KEIGN OF RICHARD I. 391

carried their complaint to the pope.1 The royal interference was also
invoked. Eanulf Glanvill forbade the execution of the second Rauuif
mandate, and summoned the subprior to Westminster on the 25th bidsTthe
of July.2 Geoffrey declined the obey the summons, but sent two tuTmandate
aged brethren in his place ; whom the justiciar charged to recall the
prior, and to send the subprior with five or six of the monks to
exhibit their privileges and charters before the king in Normandy.3

The convent were thrown into the greatest dismay by these Honorius
proceedings. That the prior should have left Verona under the yermm, ami
circumstances seemed little better than treason. Brother Haymo, backder'
who had foolishly ventured home without a protection,4 had been
instantly sent back. Other messengers were sent off to the brethren
at Verona, and to Cluny, Tours, and Bheims, to meet Honorius.5
Haymo met him at Vercelli,6 but, not being in possession of the
latest news, could not induce him to return to the court. He
proceeded homewards, and reached Soissons, where he took up his
residence with the dean of Eheims,7 until he received peremptory
directions to return to Verona.8 These he obeyed, and arrived there
on the llth of September.9 In the meantime important events had
occurred both there and nearer home.

We have seen how the archbishop had been foiled in his attempt
to get the management of the conventual estates intrusted to his
nominees during the absence of the prior. On his return from Baldwin
Wales he made another effort to secure it, which led to further to usurp the
difficulties. He began by again seizing the whole estates of the Seutof'the
convent. Then, on his way to Dover, where he was going to embark e
for the continent, he sent for the officers of the convent, and made
them a new proposition. The property of the convent was appor-
tioned partly to the cellarership for the victualling of the house,
partly to the chamberlainship for the furniture of the cells and
clothing of the monks, and partly to the sacrist for the use of the
church.10 The manors appropriated to these purposes were not,
however, managed by the obedientiaries themselves, but by three
stewards, bursars or treasurers, who received the whole revenue, and
divided it in proper proportions. The three treasurers were John of

1 Nos. Ixxiii. Ixxxiii. Ixxxix. xc. Ralph of Sarr, was also archdeacon of
They were absolved on the day of Soissons, I cannot make out. It was
their arrival at Verona, and imme- at his house that Honorius stayed at
diately returned home. Soissons, and he seems to be addressed

2 No. Ix. as archdeacon in No. xv. Gerv. 1497.
8 Nos. Ivi. Ixv. Gervase, 1504. No. Ixxix.

4 No. Ixxx. 9 No. Ixxxii.

5 Nos. Ixxvii. Ixxx. H No. cxxvii.

6 Gervase, 1497. 10 No. cxix.

7 Whether the dean of Rheims

8(J2

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

The envoys
of the con-
vent at the
king's court

Baldwin
invests the
sacrist and
cellarer at
Atencon

Boching ' and Ralph of Orpington,2 whom the archbishop had
excommunicated, and Roger Norreys,3 who, with the aged sacrist
Robert, had been sent on private business to the king in France.
The remaining two obedientiaries, Hervey the cellarer and Symon
the chamberlain, obeyed the archbishop's summons. His proposal
to them was that they should consent to hold their offices under him,
instead of the convent, and of course should render their accounts to
him only.3 This they refused to do, declaring that they would hold
their places on the same terms on which their predecessors had done.
The archbishop refused to restore the estates on any other conditions,
and forbade the cellarer to meddle any more with the affairs of the
house. He then, having appealed to the pope against the abbots of
Faversham and Battle, sailed to Normandy, on the llth of August.4
The king was at Alen9on, where a great court was to be held on the
28th. To Alen9on accordingly the archbishop betook himself, and
to his alarm found that the messengers of the convent had had an
interview with the king. These were Alexander of Dover and an old
monk named Robert or Richard, who had been chaplain to 8.
Thomas.5 Henry had expressed himself in friendly terms, and so
far imposed upon the envoys that Alexander returned home. The
archbishop proceeded to lay his statement before Henry, insisting on
resigning his see if the monks were not compelled to obedience.6

At the court on the 28th the messengers of the convent who were
sent in obedience to the command of the justiciar presented them-
selves, Robert, who had been sacrist for forty years," and Roger
Norreys. Robert was very old and stupid, Roger was a traitor. By
the king's persuasion these were induced to accept the archbishop's
terms : Roger he appointed cellarer, and Robert he re-appointed as
sacrist. They allowed themselves to be invested by him, acknow-
ledging him as their feudal lord, and as the source of their
jurisdiction over the manors appropriated to their obediences. They
returned home with letters to the convent announcing their appoint-
ment, and to the bishop of Rochester, requiring him to institute
them, and also to re-invest Symon the chamberlain as the arch-
bishop's servant.8 The king either supposed, or pretended to do so,
that these messengers had full powers to treat on behalf of the
convent, and that by yielding in this point they had satisfied the
archbishop, which was all that was wanted. He wrote, therefore, to

No. cxix.

No. cvii.

Gerv. 1504. No. xcvi.

Gerv. 1505.

No. cxxi.

Gerv. 1505.

Nos. cxxi. cxviii.

" Nos. cxi. cxii. The king also
commissioned Ranulf Gliinvill and the
bishop to invest the new obedientiaries,
which, of course, increased the fear of
the convent of being subjected to
secular power.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 393

the pope, and to Prior Honorius, claiming the credit of having
restored peace to the church.1

Roger and Robert were received at Canterbury with well-deserved The recep-
indignation. Symon refused to accept institution from the bishop, gacristand
and the aged sacrist was ordered to repudiate his act at Alen9on, as canterbury
forced on him by the king. Roger Norreys was arrested and con-
fined in the infirmary.2 The sacrist with three other brethren was
sent back to the king, to declare that from him only, and not from
the archbishop, would the convent accept restitution, and that such
restitution must be made to the prior and convent, not to the
obedientiaries.3 These messengers were not allowed to have access
to the king ; the archbishop was still more exasperated, and
attempted to close the courts of justice held by the convent in their
own name.4 He also directed his servants to take possession of the
estates of the convent, and displace their officials. A fresh com-
plaint was accordingly carried to Rome : not only had the arch-
bishop violated the ancient customs of the convent, but, by investing
the obedientiaries in the king's court, he had recognised a secular
jurisdiction in matters ecclesiastical. This was the news from home
which reached the prior soon after his return to the papal court.

There Baldwin's envoys had been working zealously during peterof
Honorius's absence. Peter of Blois and William of S. Faith had v°rona
arrived at Verona, a week after the prior had left, early in June.5
They seem to have held back, as if uncertain of their reception.
They had delayed their arrival until his departure ; now they refused
to open their budget in the presence of Master Pillius. When he
had been got out of the way, they produced on behalf of the king The pope
and primate their answers to the charges of the monks : on these j^aerss both
Pope Urban reserved his decision. They then delivered petitions in
favour of the new church, and for the revocation of the privileges
which the prior had obtained in March. Master Pillius was recalled
to state the arguments of the convent against this. He declared
that the royal letters on behalf of the new church were a mere
matter of form, and such as would necessarily be granted to any
influential person. To the claims of Baldwin he replied by stating
the rights of the convent, and denying those of the archbishop, who
had moreover put himself in the wrong by proceeding with the
prohibited building. The pope then questioned Peter of Blois as to
the use and necessity of the new college. ' The church of
Canterbury,' said Peter, 'is very high exalted and glorious, and
therefore needs much help against princes and powers, especially

1 Nos. cxiv. cxv. 2 Gerv. 1506. Nos. cxvii. cxviii. cxxi.

3 Gerv. 150(5. No. cxxiii. 4 Gerv. 1507.
5 Gerv. 1497-8-9.

894

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

The pope
silences
Peter of
Blole

Urban HI.

leaves

Verona

lllne«s of
the pope

such help as would bo supplied by wise clerks, who are much more
prudent and experienced in affairs than are monks.' ' But are not,'
asked the pope, ' the monks the ministers of the cathedral ? ' Peter
admitted it. ' If so, then why does not the archbishop use them as
his councillors ? ' Here Master Pillius broke in : ' My Lord, the
archbishop is bishop of the church of Canterbury, and also, as our
opponents say, abbot of these same monks. If, then, he is abbot, he
ought to change or alienate nothing without consent of his monks,
neither in his character of bishop can he build a church on the
estates of his chapter without their consent.' The pope next
inquired what was the archbishop's purpose in building : ' was the
see, or the body of the martyr, to be translated ? ' Peter answered
that no such proceeding was contemplated ; the archbishop was
merely carrying out the purpose of S. Anselm and S. Thomas.
' Stop,' said the pope ; 'did S. Thomas wish to build a church in his
own name ? ' Peter, so said the monks, was silenced by this august
quibble. The arguments lasted several days, but this is all that is
preserved to us of the actual discussion.1

The result of the hearing was to embitter Urban more than be-
fore against the archbishop. After Honorius's return the cause was
pressed still more urgently on him by both parties. The pope's
mind was at this time unsettled and soured by his quarrel with the
emperor, whom he threatened to excommunicate. The people of
Verona begged him not to issue his sentence whilst he was their
guest ; and during the last week of September he left the city, in-
tending, according to some authorities, to go to Venice to equip a
fleet of crusaders. He took, however, the way to Ferrara. Peter of
Blois rode with him the first day. They had been fellow-students
in former days ; now the envoy began to sing the praises of Baldwin.
The pope, who was in bad health, and never had much command
of temper, was bored by the importunity of the archdeacon. ' May
it please God,' he cried out, ' that I may never dismount from this
horse, or mount steed again, if I do not shortly dismount him from
his archbishopric.' Scarcely were the words spoken, when the cross
of gold, carried before him by the subdeacon, fell broken at his feet.2
That day he reached a place which Peter calls Sutoro or Future.
There he was seized with dysentery, and was obliged to proceed by
water to Ferrara. At Ferrara he issued a mandate to the archbishop
on the 8rd of October, directing him to demolish his new buildings and

1 Gerv. 1497-9.

* This account is given by Peter of
Blois in a fragment of a letter which,
so far as I am aware, occurs in only
one MS., New College, 127. I have
ventured to give it in the Appendix,

vol. R. 8. (No. dlxxi.), as it is a neces-
sary adjunct to the series of letters ;
but the text is corrupt and shows that
the transcriber could not read his
copy.

MEMORIALS OF THE EEIGN OF RICHARD I. 395

desecrate the site, to dissolve the collegiate foundation, and replace urban's last
the convent in statu qiw. Thirty days were allowed for compli-
ance ; after that term the bishops of Bath and Chichester were to
enforce it. At the same time he wrote to the king, insisting on the
execution of the mandate, and to the convent, annulling all sentences
of excommunication, suspension, or interdict that Baldwin might
launch against them.1

On the day these letters were issued Jerusalem was taken by Death of
Saladin, and sixteen days after the pope died. The news of both l
these events reached England nearly at the same time.2 It is
scarcely possible that Urban should have heard of the capture of the
Holy City, but he may have known that the sultan had begun the
siege, and that defence was hopeless. His death was ascribed to the
bitterness of bis grief. It is observable, however, that the letters in
this volume make no mention of the surrender as a cause of his
death. No such blow indeed was necessary to despatch an old man
worn out with heavy anxiety and stormy passions ; the dysentery
caught on his journey doubtless caused his end. In him the convent
lost a very zealous, if not a discreet patron, and the archbishop a
furious enemy. The event was announced to both parties by their
agents, Peter of Blois exhibiting a most unbecoming and heartless
joy.3 Two days after the death of Urban, the new pope was chosen.
The bishop of Albano, Baldwin's friend, took a leading part in the
election. The cardinals nominated three candidates, the bishops of
Albano and Palestrina, and Albert, the chancellor. The bishop of
Palestrina was persuaded to retire on the plea of infirmity ; Henry
of Albano refused to undertake the responsibility ; and the chancellor Election of
succeeded, as Gregory VIII.4 His first measure was to confirm all vm.°ry
the acts of his predecessor done within three months of his death ; 5 his
second, to make an exception in favour of the archbishop of Canter-
bury, thus annulling the mandates which had been gained with so He annuls

V. J rm,' A tu the mandates

much perseverance and at so great a price. This was done on the of urban in.
29th of October.

The mandate arrived in England at the end of the same month,
and the privilege exempting the convent from Baldwin's sentence
was read in the synod of the diocese at Canterbury on the 1st of
November.6 The archbishop received his letter at Caen, from Brother
Haymo,7 and declared himself willing to do justice. The king also
professed to be friendly. Matters seemed a little more favourable,

1 Nos. cxxviii. cxxix. cxxx. cxxxi. Gervase.

2 William of Newburgh says that it 3 Nos. cxxxiv. cxxxv.
was the news of the battle of July 6 4 No. cxxxv.

that killed the pope. Lib. iii. 21. 5 Nos. cxxxviii. cxxxix. Diceto, 636.

Benedict of Peterborough and Hove- Hoveden, 365.

den confirm the statement; as also 6 No. clxxvi. ' Gerv. loll.

SiK>

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

The pro-
ccediiiK« of
lJ.iI.lwin
ufter the
ilnttbof

I'rS.in

Honoring
follows the
new pope to
Pisn

lleatliof
Gregory
VIII.

when the news of Urban's death spoiled all. King and primate alike
threw off the mask. Henry ordered the justiciar to take the new
college under royal protection, which was done on the 18th of Novem-
ber ; ; and Baldwin issued injunctions for thankgiving at Hakington
for the annulling of the papal mandate.- On the 17th of December
he forbade the holding of the courts of the convent.3 Ralph of
S. Martin, one of their bitterest enemies, visited them with advice
to throw themselves on the archbishop's mercy ; and the venerable
Herbert of Bosham, with more regret, gave them the same counsel.4
But the spirited subprior was proof against all such recommendations,
and Herbert left him convinced, according to Gervase, of the duty of
resistance.

Prior Honorius was now pleading his cause over again with the
cardinals, and trying to get an interview with the new pope. He was
assured privately that justice would be done ultimately, but that for
the time it was necessary to move cautiously. He followed the court
from Ferrara, by Bologna and Modena, to Parma, and thence to
Pisa, where he arrived on the 10th of December.5 The pope pro-
fessed that he had no time to listen to him ; he was engrossed with
receiving embassies and preparing for the crusade ; the bishop of
Albano was still hostile. But just as he was congratulating himself
on the dismissal of his most dreaded opponent,6 who was sent to
conduct the matter of the crusade in Germany, the pope sickened and
died after a reign of less than two months. No time was wasted in
filling up the vacant throne. The Cistercian bishop of Albano was
absent, and the succession was offered to the Cluniac Theobald of
Ostia, the friend and patron of the monks of Canterbury. Theobald
declined the dangerous honour, and Paul Scolari, bishop of Pales-
trina, who two months before had been shouldered out of it by the
bishop of Albano, ascended the papal throne under the name of
Clement III., on the 19th of December.7 The bishop of Ostia

1 No. cxxxiii.

2 No. cxl.

* No. cxxiv. Gerv. 1513.

4 Gerv. 1513. The appearance of
Herbert in this place ought to have
refuted at once the notion that appears
in some of our early bibliographers, and
in the lists of cardinals, that Herbert
of Bosham became, after S. Thomas's
death, a cardinal and archbishop of
Benevento. The story is compounded
from the following ingredients: — 1.
Lombard of Piacenza, a friend of S.
Thomas, was cardinal and archbishop
of Benevento from 1171-1179. He
probably gave Alan of Tewkesbury his
prebend nt Benevenio. 2. Herbert,

archbishop of Compsa 1138-1180. He
was a native of Middlesex, and Ralph
de Diceto makes him archbishop of
Cosenza, and swallowed up by an
earthquake in 1185. 3. A different
person, named Ruffus, who was arch-
bishop of Cosenza, and perished in
that way in 1185. See Ughelli, Italia
Sacra, viii. 192, Ac. ; Ciaconius, i.
1094.

* Nos. cxlviii. cliv.

• No. clxi. Henry proceeded into
Germany, where he gave the cross to
Frederick Barbarossa, and proceeding
thence through the Low Countries,
died at Arras, July 14, 1188.

7 No. clxii.

MEMORIALS OF THE EEIGN OF EJ CHARD I. 397

announced the result to the convent, advising them to authorise element in.
the continued stay of the prior at the papal court.1

In England the death of Urban was regarded as insuring the Baldwin
triumph of the archbishop. Hitherto he had managed to render bishop of
nugatory the whole procedure of the convent. He now prepared to re- canteriwy1
turn, and, in concert with the king, sent the bishop of Rochester with
a proposal to the convent on the 9th of January, 1188.'2 The bishop,
attended by a few knights and by the canons of Hakington, harangued
the monks in the chapter-house, extolling the virtues of Baldwin,
and counselling submission. He did not, however, offer any
relaxation of the harshness which had been hitherto exercised by the
archbishop, and ended by confessing that he was sent to inspect
and place under seal the treasure of the church. The subprior took
a day for consideration, and on the morrow replied, refusing to let
the bishop inspect the treasure, and declining to surrender the seal
or to receive restitution of the estates on the archbishop's terms, violent
Having said thus much, he solemnly appealed to the pope, and asked against the8
the bishop for licence to proceed to Rome with his appeal. The
bishop, unable to answer, retired in dismay, and the knights who
accompanied him attempted to seize the court of the monks.3 The
next day, Monday, January II,4 Ranulf Glanvill arrived in person,
and had a peaceable interview with the subprior. The same day
Baldwin landed at Dover. On the Wednesday Geoffrey sent two
monks on horseback to Wingham, to offer him the customary
procession. He replied by excommunicating the messengers and
seizing their horses. They returned in great tribulation on foot, and
were followed by William FitzNeal,5 the faithless steward who had

1 No. el. thus be seen how, the court of the

2 Gervase, 1514. Nos. cxlvii. clxviii. monks being seized by the soldiers,
It is necessary, in order to understand their provisions were cut off, and they
the proceedings, to remember the were confined to the dormitory, refec-
position of the conventual buildings. tory, cloister and church buildings.
The archbishop's palace and court The seizure of the gates of the close
stood to the north-west of the church. and of the cemetery stopped all access
East of them stood the cloister, ad- from without to the church, and put
joining the nave ; east of that was the the monks to great straits for pro-
convent garden, and east of that, visions. There is a good map in
round the east end, and down the Somner's Canterbury, and two beauti-
south side of the church as far as the ful plans, one copied from a twelfth -
gate of the close, extended the ceme- century MS., in a memoir on the
tery, which was divided into an outer conventual buildings read by Mr.
and inner portion by the porta cceme- Mackenzie Walcott before the Institute
terii : this is called the court of the of British Architects, Deo. 15, 18(52.
cemetery. Immediately adjoining the 3 Nos. cli. cliii.

cloister on the north and east were * Gervase, 1516. Nos. clviii. clix.

the dormitory and refectory; beyond clxvi.

which on the north was the court of * Gerv. 151G ; Foss's Judges, 5.

the convent, surrounded by the offices, 241 ; Fitz-Stephen, 2(J7, 298 ; Roger of

brewhouse, storehouses, &c., which Pontigny, 160-161.

joined nearly the city wall. It will

898

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

The raouks
confined to
the im>ii:i--
tery

Escape of

Roger

Norreys

deserted S. Thomas in the hour of his last peril. William found the
court of the convent closed against him, broke through the wall, and
occupied the gate and the outer offices ; ' whereupon the subprior
suspended divine service, and stripped the altars as in the time of
interdict.2 The next day the servants of the convent were compelled
to swear that they would prevent the monks from going outside the
walls ; the inner wall of the court was scaled, and the monks shut
up within the line of the cloister, their provisions now falling into
the enemies' hands. After an ineffectual attempt at reconciliation,
made by the bishop of Rochester and Hugh of Nunant, Baldwin on
the following Sunday excommunicated the subprior and his advisers.3
The very next day he received the news of Pope Gregory's death,
and, thinking that he had gone too far for his own safety, left
Wingham, and, having preached an apologetic sermon at Hakington,
hurried to London. He also made another offer of restitution, by
the prior of S. Gregory's and the sheriff of Kent, and entreated the
convent to resume divine service. The subprior answered the
proposal as usual, and refused the request. The messengers, how-
ever, opened the little door in the gate of the cemetery for the
admission of pilgrims, and a few days later the gate itself was opened
by the sheriff, but it was still strictly guarded. In this way the
monks were kept in a state of imprisonment for eighty-four weeks,
during which time they were dependent for food on the gifts of the
pilgrims ; even Jews were found among their benefactors. They
were so well supplied, it seems, that two hundred strangers were
daily fed with the superfluous contributions ; nor were these confined
to absolute necessaries, for fish, vegetables, and pepper cake were
among the constant offerings ; even poultry was presented for the
use of the sick.4 About the end of January Roger Norreys, the
intruder cellarer, escaped from durance by making his way through
the cloaca of the monks,5 and betook himself to Baldwin at Otford.6

' Nos. clvi. clvii.

- Gerv. 1517. No. clxvii.

1 Gerv. 1518. No. clxvii.

4 Gerv. 1520, to Aug. 12, 1189.

5 This building occupies a con-
spicuous place in the ancient plan of the
convent, extending from the infirmary
across the court of the monks almost
us far us the dormitory. If Roger was
still confined in the infirmary he could
have easily escaped into the cemetery,
or if not, through the cloaca in the court
of the convent, which, as well as the
cemetery, was in the hands of the enemy.
It may be well just to point out here
that Roger Cloacarius, who is men-

tioned once or twice, is, of course,
Roger Norreys. The play on the name
of Norreys occurs several times, as
Rogerus ab Aquilone, and the brother
who has set his throne in the sides of
the north. Similar are the references
to William de Sancta Fide, W. Malm
Fidei, and W. Sine Fide : to the un-
happy pretensions of Brother Felix ;
and to the unnecessary service of
Roger Norreys after his escape. Who
the little priest was who 'crebrius
ostrea captat,' No. Ixxxi., I do not
know, unless it was the abbot of
Faversham.
• Gerv. 1519. No. ccviii.

MEMORIALS OF THE EEIGN OF RICHARD I. 899

The king landed at Winchelsea on the 30th of January, ' and was cause of the
prevented from visiting Canterbury by the news of the suspension of the couucu
divine service. He sent on the 4th of February 2 to the subprior tonGiUtl"g~
orders to resume it, and summoned him with six of the brethren to
the council which was to be held at Gaitington on the llth.
Geoffrey refused either to appear or to send representatives. The
council assembled, and the archbishop stated his complaint against
the convent in very bitter language ; he also demanded the arrest of
the subprior as excommunicate. The convent were defended by
Reginald, bishop of Bath, who prevented the request of Baldwin
from being granted. The king proposed an arbitration, and sent
two bishops to Canterbury to persuade the convent to send repre-
sentatives to court. Four monks were accordingly sent on the 24th interview of
of February,3 and presented themselves before Henry at Clarendon on with Henry
the 1st of March, with copies of the charters and privileges on which atolarendou>
the convent relied. To the horror and disgust of the monks, the
king declared with a magnificent oath that the royal charters were
not genuine, all his councillors, except Roger the almoner and
William of S. Mere 1'Eglise, confirming the statement. Before he
dismissed them he bade them meet the archbishop and himself
at Winchester, and they were afterwards summoned on to Cirencester, and wi.th
where they met the archbishop going into Wales to preach the ctreucester
crusade. When they came into his presence, they saluted him.
Baldwin returned no answer ; his clerks received the attention with
mockery and insult. Henry now renewed the proposal of an
arbitration, to which Baldwin consented. The envoys replying that
they could not get a fair arbitration in England, where the arch-
bishop was supreme, Henry administered a reproof for the uncharitable
suspicion, and proposed the recall of the prior. ' If we consent
to recall the prior, who,' the brethren asked, ' will engage to provide
for the sustenance of the convent until his return ? ' Henry would
not promise ; the monks were sent back to consult their brethren,
and the three oldest members of the convent were summoned to
appear before the king. Geoffrey replied to the summons that it
was impossible to send them ; one was ruptured, another afflicted
with haemorrhoids, the third was a paralytic : he sent two others,
who were immediately sent back by the king as unfit for his
purpose. Henry was now called away by serious business, and
Baldwin spent the spring in Wales.4

The suit was in the meantime being vigorously pressed at Rome.
Immediately after the bishop of Rochester's visit on the 9th of

1 Gerv. 1520. 3 Gerv. 1523. Nos. clxxxvi. ccxl.

- Gerv. 1520. Nos. clxxxvi. cclxxvi. 4 Gervase, 1528.

too

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

John de
Bremble
goes to

BOII if

New mull-
dates issued
and a legate
promised

The arch-
bishop con-
temn* the
mandates of

Ciement

January, four brethren were sent to the pope,1 one of whom, brother
John de Bremble, was from this time the life and soul of the cause.
His letters are all worth reading ; perhaps they are the best in the
volume. He crossed the Great S. Bernard in February,2 and reached
Rome on the 27th of the month.3 Prior Honorius had not been
idle. As early as the 26th of January he had procured a mandate
dated at Siena,4 reaffirming the last letters of Urban, but not
accompanied by a commission to enforce execution. The news
brought by Brother John of the outrages committed in January was
delivered to the pope on the 1st of March,5 and on the 17th Clement
commissioned the prior of Faversham and Master Farreman, warden
of the hospital of 8. James at Canterbury, to excommunicate the
persons who had violently entered the monastery.6 By the same
messenger the prior ordered the subprior to resume divine service.7
On the llth of April the pope promised to send a legate with full
powers to settle the whole cause, and hopes were held out that the
bishop of Ostia would be chosen.8

The mandate of January 26th was served on Baldwin on the
22nd of March, in the presence of two bishops, probably at or near
Llandaff. To the bearers he returned no answer, but wrote to
Hakington directing his servants to intrench the new buildings, and
put them in a state of defence.9

On the 15th of April, being Good Friday,10 the letter of March 17th
was received at Canterbury, with the prior's command to resume the
service. The monks reluctantly obeyed this direction, and the prior
of Faversham on the 28rd executed the mandate. This produced

No. clxv.

No. cxcvii., a very amusing letter.

No. ccv.

No. cxciii.

No. ccv.

No. ccxiii.

No. ccxvi.

No. ccxxviii.

Gerv. 1529. No. ccxxiii. The two
bishops were Peter of St. David's, who
accompanied Baldwin on his tour, and
the bishop of Llandaff, in whose dio-
cese he was at the time. The data
for fixing the chronology of Giraldus,
who gives the history of the tour in
his Itinerarium Cambria, are very
scanty. He makes the expedition
start from Radnor about Ash Wed-
nesday, March 2? Ranulf Glanvill
having just returned from thence to
England. But it is clear from No.
ccxl. that Ranulf Glanvill was on the
let of March at Clarendon, whilst

the archbishop did not reach Ciren-
cester, or indeed Winchester, until
some days later. At least a week
must have elapsed after the 2nd of
March before they left Radnor : in
about ten days they reached Llandaff,
where they spent two nights, the
bishop of Llandaff having met them
two days before at Caerleon : about a
fortnight later they reached Llanba-
darn, and on April 10 were at Nevyn.
The place where the mandate was
delivered was thus between Caerleon
and Abergavenny, where the bishop of
Llandaff left them. Master Silvester,
who treated the pope's mandates so
contumeliously in No. cci., was not
Giraldus, but the steward of the arch-
bishop's household, who is mentioned
in Benedict of Peterborough and else-
where.

'• Gerv. 1530.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 401

a riot, in which a nephew of S. Thomas took a conspicuous part, Reception of
and was committed, with several other partisans of the convent, to date?at
prison, greatly to the scandal of the faithful.1 Master Farreman, Canterbul'y
who had gone to London to avoid acting in the matter, came in Riot at Can-
nevertheless for a share of the indignation of the archbishop's party.
Robert de Bechetune, one of the canons of Hakington,2 led a
detachment of rioters against the hospital, and the warden was
obliged to appeal to the pope on behalf of his leprous old women.
The parish priests of Canterbury took part with the canons, and
publicly announced that the papal excommunication against the
aggressors was invalid.3

Through the early part of the summer the convent were cheered Baldwin and

Henry leave

with reports from Borne of the speedy mission of the legate ; they England
were also relieved from the presence of Baldwin, who sailed for France
on the 16th of June.4 War had broken out, and the king's foreign
dominions were in imminent danger. Henry followed in person
on the 10th of July ; 5 and about the same time the communications
from the brethren at Rome stopped suddenly for a very melancholy
reason.

As soon as the pope had given his promise to send a legate a latere,
John de Bremble started for home. Honorius, who seems to have John de
looked on his energetic assistant with a little jealousy, remained returns
behind with five other monks, Haymo of Thanet, Edmund, Humfrey,
Symon, and Ralph the almoner. The letters of Edmund and
Humfrey are preserved. They are the compositions of puzzle-headed
men, whose studies had lain in mystic interpretation of Scripture
and in unfulfilled prophecy. Haymo was, as we have seen, a very
active and determined man, but imprudent. John, on the other
hand, was a shrewd observer, plain-spoken and witty ; a man of
business, with a considerable command of money, and a fixed and
efficacious conviction that at Rome money was all-powerful. Honorius
seems to have felt it hard to keep up with the energy of John, and
John evidently kicked against the devout simplicity and leisurely
management of the prior. He accordingly went northward, and
reached Arras on his way home.6 The bishop of Arras was the one John de
Cistercian friend of the convent, and Brother John persuaded him to engages the
offer his mediation with the archbishop. He therefore visited the wshop°f
Canterbury in July or August, with proposals from the archbishop, of Arras
which received the usual answer.7 The bishop offered then to

1 Nos. ccxviii. ccxix. ccxxvii. Robertson's Becket, p. 353.

Ralph, probably a brother of the - Gerv. 1532. 3 No. ccxxiv.

person called in the Great Roll of the 4 Gerv. 1535. * Gerv. 1535.

Pipe, 1 Ric. I. ' Johannes films 6 No. ccxliv. 7 No. ccxlvii.
Rohesisa sororis Sancti Tom.' Of.

D D

402

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

Death of the
brethren at
Uouie

John de
Bnmbta

returns to
Rome

He starts
with the
legate Ralph
Nigel

Death of the
legate

represent the cause of the convent at the general chapter of the
Cistercians in September. The offer was accepted, and a deputation
of the brethren attended with him. The matter was brought before
the chapter, but the abbot of Clteaux undertook Baldwin's defence,
and nothing further resulted from the proceeding.1

It was perhaps at Citeaux that the terrible news was received by
the brethren that a plague had broken out in Rome, and that five of
the monks left with Honorius were dead. Haymo, the promoter of
the first appeal, went first on the 7th of July. Edmund and Humfrey
followed on the llth and 18th, Symon on the 15th, Ralph the almoner
on the 18th. The prior wrote the sad story to the convent,2 but the
letter does not seem to have reached them until the middle of
September. The subprior did immediately the best possible thing :
directed John de Bremble to return to the papal court at once.3 He
took with him Brother Elias and a second Symon. John borrowed
a mark at Rheims from a friendly canon, and set out in faith. Before
he reached Siena he met a servant of the archbishop of Lyons, who
told him that the prior was dead. Between Siena and Rome he
beard of the death of the bishop of Ostia. When he reached Rome,
but one of the brethren, William, was alive, and he was in great
danger. The mortality had extended to the servants ; John's first
act was to attend the cook's funeral.4 He lost no time in besieging
the pope, and on the 10th of December succeeded in getting a mandate
reiterating the injunctions of Pope Urban, and committed for execu-
tion to Ralph Nigel, cardinal of S. Praxedes.5

With Cardinal Ralph Brother John set off forthwith for England.
By way of making a favourable impression on the legate he offered
him a magnificent reliquary. Ralph, however, was a conscientious
man, and refused the implied bribe, but he borrowed the prior's
packhorse, and further commended John to the care of one of his
retinue, whose expenses he was expected to pay. When the cavalcade
reached Parma, his friend's horse fell lame, and John had to buy
him a substitute. The new horse, which had cost a mark, turned
out to be useless, and a second was bought, also at John's expense/'
Having thus propitiated both the legate and his kinsman, he was in
hopes that at last the cause was prospering, when, sad to say, the
cardinal himself fell ill at Pavia, and having got on with difficulty
to Mortara, died there on the 80th of December.7

Brothers John, William, and Symon turned back to Rome in

' No. cclxxiv. * No. oclxxii.

1 No. cclxxv.

4 No. ccxcii. Brother John must
have fallen behind his companions,
as he heard of the death of the bishop
between Siena and Rome, whereas

the other brethren arrived at Rome
four days before the bishop's ucath.
No. cclxxxviii.

» No. ccxci. • No. ccxc.

' Nos. ccxcii. ccxciii. ccxciv. Gerv.
1538.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF EICHARD I. 403

despair. Their second journey was hardly more cheerful than the John's
first. At Bardi, in the country of Parma, the prior's packhorse, from visit to
which so much had been hoped, was lost.1 At Siena they found ]
one of their servants dead. At Borne the king's agents were in full
force, Simon of Apulia and four companions urging that Cardinal
Octavian might be sent to England as legate, that Baldwin might be
permitted to proceed with his church, and that the disposition of the
oblations might be restored to him. The pope refused to listen to The pope
their arguments, and doubted their credentials. They quitted Kome hearStneto
in chagrin, leaving their business in the hands of Eobert of Rouen .^"^
and Richard of Norwich, ' an enemy with a very fat face and a hoarse
voice.' In January or February 1189, the monks had their audience ;
the pope was very gracious, and asked their advice in the choice of
a legate.2 The brethren proposed their three friends, Gratian, Soffred,
and Peter of Piacenza, the last of whom was anxious to undertake
the expedition.3 Clement, however, explained that it would be
imprudent to send one whose very name was hateful to the king, as
was Gratian's ; the other two were employed elsewhere : he suggested
•John of Anagni, cardinal of S. Mark. The mandate 4 was renewed John of
with the insertion of John's name instead of Ralph's, and John and appointed
Elias set out in his company. They reached Paris in April, and 1(
went from there to Le Mans,5 where they had an interview with the
king on S. Dunstan's day.6

During the winter of 1188 little had happened at home to cheer
the imprisoned convent. Gervase notes only a grand aurora borealis
on the 20th of December. The letters from Rome were few and sad.
The king and his counsellors in Normandy were supposed to be
meditating further oppressions ; Baldwin also was abroad ; the
correspondence that seems to fall in with this period consists of letters The convent
of condolence from other monasteries, and of complaints and petitions other mouas-
for help from that of Canterbury.

After Christmas they sent two envoys, H. and R., to the king in They send
France. They took Rheims on their way, and there fell in with the Henry in
messenger from Rome,7 who had been sent on with a copy of the I
mandate intrusted to Cardinal Ralph. In company with him they
went on to Chaumont in the Vexin, where Brother H. left the other
two, being afraid to meet the king. From Chaumont they proceeded
to Gisors, and thence to the king at Le Mans, where they found the
archbishop as well. It happened that the papal letters were delivered
to Baldwin the very day that he heard of the death of Cardinal Ralph.
The bearer, Brother Jonas, having discharged his commission, quitted
the city, and left Brother R. to face the king alone. He had his

1 No. ccxcii. - No. ccxcvi. 5 No. ccv. ti No. cccvii.

3 No. ccxcv. 4 No. cccviii. ~ No. ccxcvii.

D D 2

404

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

Interview

with Henry
and Baldwin
at Le Man*

Baldwin in-
terpolate*
the royal
letter

Royal com-
missioners
vi-it Can-
terbury

Osbcrt do
BrUto flic*
from the
convent

audience on the 1st of February, 1189. The king, who was under
the influence of Roger the almoner, a friend of the convent, listened
to the monk with unusual calmness, and ended the conference by
swearing that the convent should have their rights. Roger the
almoner and Hubert Walter were directed to draw up a letter to
them in the king's name. The letter was written and sealed, when
the archbishop, according to Brother R., came down in a passion,
and ordered Hubert and Peter of Blois to break the seal and read the
contents.1 He then added three clauses. This letter, when it
arrived at Canterbury, contained an assurance of the king's good-
will ; an account of the attempt that he had made to bring about a
reconciliation, to which he found the archbishop not indisposed, and
a proposal to send the bishops of Ely and Rochester, with Ranulf
Glanvill and the deans of York and Lincoln, to negotiate. With
them on their return he charged the convent to send representatives
with full power to treat of peace. The letter concludes with a
strong recommendation to submit, and a threat in case of obstinacy,
which were probably the clauses added by the archbishop.2

These commissioners visited Canterbury on the 24th of March.3
They put the question, Would the convent send plenipotentiaries to
the king ? The subprior politely refused : ' None of the brethren
dared to undertake such a responsibility, nor would the convent
venture on such a measure whilst the cause was before the pope.'
The justiciar suggested that, if they dared not send an envoy with
full powers, they might at least send a deputation to propitiate
Henry. The subprior hinted that after the events at Alen9on in
1187 the king was not to be trusted. Ranulf could hardly gainsay
this, so the bishop of Rochester replied with a prayer that they
would confide in the king, and not refuse his good offices. The sub-
prior would refuse no man's good offices, but ' rumor de veteri faciet
venture, timeri.' At this juncture arrived the courier from Rome
with the news of the appointment of John of Anagni as legate. This
broke up the debate ; the messengers returned to the king pricked at
the heart. Two days after Osbert de Bristo, an unworthy monk,
escaped from the convent into the court of the archbishop's palace,
and took the oath of fidelity to Baldwin.4 Gervase says that he
expected to be rewarded with a bishopric. The subprior, now
thinking himself safe under the protection of the legate, con-
descended to send four brethren to the king ; they were stopped,
however, at the gate of the cemetery on the Saturday in Easter
week, and not allowed to proceed.

John of Anagni reached Le Mans in May, and was present when,

1 Gerv. 1539.

2 No. dlxii.

Gerv. 1540.

No. cccii. Gerv. 1540.

MEMOKIALS OF THE KEIGN OF EICHARD I. 405

on the 19th, John de Bremble presented the mandate to the arch- The legate
bishop.1 Baldwin received it with reverence, but in silence; his court^til
clerks heaped abuse on Brother John, who had formerly been a 5
member of the archbishop's household. This he bore patiently ; the
archbishop took no more notice of him. The next day John called
on the legate, who told him that Baldwin denied the charges made
against him, and professed himself ready to restore all the property
of the convent on the ancient terms. As they were conversing,
Baldwin himself arrived and argued his case ; John tried to provoke
him into a passion, and soon succeeded. The conference broke up
in confusion, and more important events interfered to prevent its
being resumed.

A colloquy was held between the kings of England and France outbreak of
at Le Mans on the 9th of June,2 which resulted in an outbreak of
war. Kanulf Glanvill was sent to England to levy forces, and on his
way paid his devotions at Canterbury. He had an interview with
the subprior, who hinted to him in a gentle way that the king, being
in great straits, might, if prudently approached, see at last the use
of mercy. Eanulf answered that the monks had yet to learn what Ranuif
what mercy was, if they would, for the love of Rome, do nothing to visitsVban-
please the king, the archbishop, or anyone else. On the subprior's to
repeating that experience had shown that neither Henry nor his
advisers were to be trusted, Eanulf quitted him in indignation :
' Rome is all you seek : Rome alone will be your ruin.' Geoffrey
did, however, send a small deputation to the king, hoping to find
him softened by his misfortunes. These penetrated to the seat of
war, and found Henry at Azai, just after he had been compelled to Last inter-
accept terms of peace.3 They approached with a salutation : ' The monks with
convent of Canterbury salute you as their lord.' The king replied*
1 1 was once their lord, and am still, and will be yet ' ; adding
between his teeth, ' small thanks to you, wicked traitors.' He then
listened to their petition, and dismissed them with a promise of
letters.4 They went from Azai to Rouen, where the legate was, the
Icing having forbidden him to go to England. With the advice of
the legate, the monks offered to accept restitution from the arch-
bishop. Baldwin tried to temporise, and ended by declaring that he
would do nothing without the king. That week the king died at The king's
Chinon.

Baldwin returned to England, after more than a year's absence, Baldwin re-
on the 81st of July.5 He seems to have determined to make some and'visTts16
sort of an arrangement with the monks before the coronation, and
on the day after his landing summoned the officers of the convent

1 No. cccvii. - Gem. 1543. 4 No. cccxii. s Gerv. 1546.

3 No. cccxi. Gerv. 1544.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

Baldwin
tries to com-
pel the con-
vent to
snbtnit

Tbe queen
anil the
justicUr
prevail on
tbe convent
to accept
restitution

Tbe blockade
of tbe con-
vent raised

to Wingham.1 Alan, the third prior, appeared, with a few of the
brethren. The archbishop began by demanding the deposition of
the subprior and John de Bremble. Alan answered that he came
only as a messenger, and had no power to treat of such matters.
The archbishop lifted up his hands to heaven, and cried three times,
' God avenge me on the subprior.' Alan replied, ' If the subprior
were now where he will be before a hundred years are over, it would
make no difference ; we will never yield.' ' Well,' said Baldwin, ' I
tell you judgment is passed on him, and his punishment is at the
door.' On the 5th of August, the archbishop came to the cathedral,
and gave the benediction after the Gospel. He also invited some of
the elder monks to dine with him, which they refused to do under
the circumstances. On the morrow he sent to offer them restitution
of their possessions, saving their rights and his own and the pope's
mandate. This was accepted, and Alan received seisin by the gift of a
book. But no sooner was this done than Baldwin broke out against
the subprior, declaring he would take him wherever he could catch him ;
he also deposed Hervey the cellarer, and nominated a monk named
Felix in his place. This immediately caused a tumult ; the monks
insisted upon being put in bodily possession of the restored estates, and
Baldwin attempted to force upon them the compact of Alen9on. The
convent replied with a prayer that the archbishop would fulfil the pope's
mandate. He offered to do it, on condition that he should appoint
the obedientiaries, the convent managing the estates as before. This
they were disposed to accept, but Baldwin repented of his offer, and
demanded the nomination of the treasurers as well. He did not,
however, wait for an answer, but went off to Tenham. The sub-
prior, feeling himself no longer safe, fled from Canterbury on the 9th,
and crossing the straits proceeded first to Arras and then in search
of the legate. The queen regent Eleanor and Ranulf Glanvill were
not less anxious than the archbishop to settle tbe quarrel before the
arrival of Richard in England, and after the subprior's departure
sent the abbot of Hyde and the prior of Bermondsey to Canterbury,
who by threats tried to induce the convent to accept the cellarer
appointed by Baldwin, and to receive restitution from them in the
archbishop's name. After another angry discussion this was done,
on the 12th of August, the rights and privileges on both sides being
reserved.2 The gates, which had been shut since the 18th of January,
1188, were opened, and the convent gained possession of their house ;
the questions in dispute being, however, as far off as ever from settle-
ment.

It is possible that Baldwin was content to make this concession

1 No. cccxiv.

Gerv. 1549.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 407

in ignorance of what the new sovereign's sentiments might be on Richard's

the case. But Richard soon showed himself even more determined thfhSate °

than his father that his rights and dignity should not be infringed.

He ordered the legate into Poictou to collect the Saladin tithe, and

bade him leave the monks of Canterbury for himself to deal with.1

The legate remonstrated with the ministers, Walter of Coutances

and Hugh of Nunant, but in vain. Brother John began to mistrust

the legate, and wrote in haste to Canterbury for a present to secure

his wavering friendship, a handsome grey greatcoat, or a robe of

martens' skins. It was indeed neccessary to strike whilst the iron

was hot. For at Rome the archbishop's friends were rising ;

Octavian was promoted to the see of Ostia ; Albinus, ' a convertible

man,' to Albano ; Bobo, an open supporter of Baldwin, to Portus ;

the Tuscan party, Gratian and Soffred, the only friends left to the

convent, had deserted the court. -

The coronation of Richard was celebrated on the 3rd of September. The corona-
Eight monks represented the convent on the occasion,3 and the council at
bishops of Durham and Bath were prepared to resist the petition G
that Baldwin was expected to make for his new church. Baldwin,
however, kept a discreet silence. From London the court moved to
Gaitington, where a parliament was held on the 17th, at which the
king confirmed the charters of the convent. The legate was still
forbidden to enter England, and the archbishop was allowed to
have his own way. He resolved to proceed to extremities, came
down to Canterbury on the 6th of October,4 and, to the horror of the Baldwin
monks, appointed as the new prior Roger Norreys ; he then seized the Noireyf °g'
cemetery gate, that messengers might not be sent to the legate. prior
Roger immediately took Osbert de Bristo into his counsels, and
committed to him the management of the estates.

It is hardly conceivable that Baldwin ever intended to maintain Despair of
Roger Norreys in the position of prior ; he was certainly and notori-
ously a most unfit person for any spiritual office, a man with neither
character, temper, nor tact.5 The archbishop probably thought
that such an appointment would compel the monks to submit, and
that done, the obnoxious prior might be provided for elsewhere.
The measure did in fact reduce the monks to despair. They sent

1 No. cccxv. '-' No. cccxv. perhaps be supposed, in Baldwin's

" No. cccxxiv. favour, that Roger had not yet ex-

1 No. cccxxvi. Gerv. 1551. hibited his bad propensities ; certainly

1 Of the bad character of Roger nothing is said about them in the

Norreys there can be no doubt. See correspondence ; and Gervase wrote

the account given of him by Giraldus, his book ten or eleven years later.

in his Speculum Ecclesiffi (Ang. Sac. His conduct as prior was evidently

i. 139) ; by the historian of Evesham such that Baldwin would not support

(ed. Macray, pp. 104-107) ; and by him, and he was deposed within two

Gervase himself, c. 150(5. It may months.

•JOS

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

They semi
to t lie court
at West-
minster

Fail are of
the king's
Brat attempt
at a com-
promise

The king
comes In
state to
Canterbury

He tries to
make peace

to the king, who had recommended them strongly to compromise,
first to treat of terms, next to offer a bribe ; that failing, they threw
themselves on his mercy. On November 8th their messengers were
received at Westminster. Among them were nearly all the
brethren who had taken active part in the struggle ; the old sacrist
Robert, Symon the treasurer, John of Boching, Ralph of Orpington,
Gervase the historian, Nigel the poet, Master William, and Roger
Norreys.1 Baldwin attempted to get the first word ; Master
William had been excommunicated : he must leave the court. The
whole convent he accused of embezzling the treasure of the church.
The brethren on their part demanded the removal of Roger Norreys,
refusing him the title of prior. Reginald of Bath, as usual, supported
the convent. Hugh of Durham tried to act as mediator ; their
other friends advised them to accept the king's arbitration ; and on
the following day they yielded so far as to produce their powers,
and accept the proposal of a compromise. The king nominated the
committee, the monks challenging only two Cistercian abbots whom
he proposed. At last a jury was empanneled, eight bishops, five
abbots, and the prior of Merton. The monks were now asked to
declare that they would accept the decision of the committee, when
Master William insisted that it could be done only on the under-
standing that the judgment should be guided by the charters and
privileges of the church. A division followed ; the monks with-
drew their consent to the arbitration ; the object of the meeting
was defeated, and nothing remained but an appeal to force. Baldwin
threatened to seize the monastery and to disperse the brethren ;
the king insisted on the proposed arbitration ; the legate was still
forbidden to cross the straits ; and the last hope from Rome was
extinguished.

Richard and his whole court arrived at Canterbury on the 27th
of November. He was received with great pomp by the convent in
the presence of all the bishops : in his train were the king of
Scotland and Geoffrey Plantagenet, the elect of York. The day
after the reception the archbishop of Rouen came from the king,
to ask the convent whether they were still in the same mind. They
replied that whilst Roger Norreys was called prior, and the church
of Hakington still in being, there could be no peace. ' Will you,'
he asked, ' consent to an arbitration, if the archbishop will yield on
these two points ? ' They agreed, on condition that their charters
should receive a fair consideration. The king, hearing this, sent
word that on this understanding he would himself depose the prior
and demolish the buildings, if the archbishop could not be prevailed
upon to do it. Baldwin justly complained of this ; it was not fair
' No. cccxxix. Gervase, 1553-1562.

MEMOEIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 409

that he should yield two of the chief points of the quarrel, and after
all have to submit to arbitration on the rest. Seeing that the
king and bishops thought him unreasonable, he called for a copy
of the rule of S. Benedict, and insisted on his rightful position as
abbot on the first principles of regular order.

Eichard now struck out a new plan. It was clear that the arch- Baldwin
bishop would not yield on these points, and yet submit to an two chief
arbitration on the rest. It was not to be expected ; but if the tiTcmivent
archbishop would yield those two, would the convent consent to ^ercyon
throw themselves on his mercy for the rest ? If so an agreement the rest-
might be secured. Baldwin would surrender the college and the
prior ; the monks would allow him to decide the other points by his
own sense of justice. The brethren, persuaded by their friends, at
last consented on condition that for form's sake a few of their
charters should be read. The king whispered to the archbishop
some words that were not heard, and then, turning to the monks,
bade them not to be afraid if in the terms of the agreement language
were introduced to spare the feelings of the archbishop. Both
parties were then called to the chapter-house.

It was growing dark, being late in the afternoon, and a fog, The final
which Gervase considered supernatural, added to the gloom ; even effected™1*
the king in his glittering robes could scarcely be distinguished. The
archbishop of Eouen rose and said, ' Blessed be the God and Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all
consolation : the Day-spring from on high hath visited us.' The
words stuck in his throat ; he stopped for a moment and added, ' A
certain discord between the lord archbishop and the monks of this
convent has been long protracted ; but by the advice of the king and The compro-
of the bishops who are present, ourself among them, a way of peace by the king's
has been found. We have adjudged that the archbishop had power c
to build himself a church wherever he pleased, and to institute his
own prior. Let the convent beg the mercy of the archbishop, and
he will remit his anger against them.' The monks were thrown
into consternation at this : the two points that the archbishop was
to yield were decided in his favour ; they themselves were at his
mercy : this had come of the king's whispering. When they were
called up before Eichard, one of them attempted to speak, but the
king beckoned to him to be silent, and ordered them all to kneel.
They obeyed, and one of the oldest in the company faltered out, ' If,
reverend father, we have in any part of this dispute offended your
grace, we beg that you will remit your anger against us and consent
to preserve the rights of the church.' Baldwin answered, ' I remit
my indignation against you, and all yours, except the subprior, who
by his own authority suspended my church from divine service.'

410

.MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

The visit
and act of
the legate

li.il.lwin
goes 011 the

The monks remained on their knees entreating pardon for the sub-
prior. At last the archbishop said, ' Let him come, then, as you have
done and ask pardon, and he may have it with the rest of you ' ; he
added, ' As you ask that my anger may be remitted against you and
yours, so I ask you to forgive, from your heart, me and mine, what-
ever we have offended in word or deed.' The bishop of Rochester then
rose and announced that the prior should be deposed and the college
demolished ; when thanks had been given and Te Deum sung, the
archbishop would give his reconciled children the kiss of peace.
This was done, and Baldwin on the following day, in the chapter-
house, restored the estates of the convent which remained in his
hands, and relieved the prior from his office. A deed was drawn up
and attested by the king and arbitrating prelates, recording the
termination, by compromisa, of the whole cause.1 Richard then left
Canterbury, and the legate, who had been waiting at Dover for ten
days, was allowed to visit the church. Even this, however, was not
suffered without deliberation. Some few of the bishops proposed
that he should be honourably received ; others urged that he should
be compelled to depart at once. The archbishop voted for admitting
him, but sending him back as quickly as could be done. He came,
therefore, and lodged in the palace at the archbishop's charges, being
closely watched that he might not be tampered with by the convent.
The monks succeeded in getting a private interview with him, at
which Baldwin, who saw that nothing was to be feared from him,
probably connived. He informed the monks that the king had told
him of the compromise, by which the collegiate buildings at
Hakington were to be demolished, and the chapel to be served by a
few priests, who should pray for the soul of king Henry. The
monks declared that they had accepted no such condition. The
legate could do nothing but groan over the wickedness of the
persecutors ; not daring to advise the convent to resist, and anxious
to get away without committing himself, he recommended them to
temporise. He was conducted with great reverence to Dover by the
archbishop's clerks ; but before he went he executed a secret deed,
declaring that the compromise had been extorted from the convent
by fear, and was null and void of effect prejudicial to their rights.
This was kept a profound secret, and reserved for future use.2

The king left England for the crusade on the 14th of December.3
The archbishop remained in the country till March, arranging his
affairs before his pilgrimage. Roger Norreys having been made
abbot of Evesham, Baldwin instituted Osbert de Bristo as prior ;
and on the 19th of February, 1190, at Westminster, appealed to the

No. cccxxxv.

Gerv. 1563, 1678.

Diceto, 650.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 411

Holy See against all who should attempt to alter the state of his
church during his absence.1 He also directed the destruction of the
collegiate buildings at Hakington, and the removal of the materials
to Lambeth, where he proposed to build his church according to the
compromise. For this purpose he exchanged with the convent of
Rochester a piece of land in the Isle of Grain for twenty-four acres
at Lambeth for a site. The exchange was confirmed by the king, as
was the foundation of the church in honour of S. Thomas and S.
Stephen, on the 20th of March at Rouen.2 The archbishop had left
England for ever on the 6th. He wrote but one letter afterwards to
the convent, announcing his arrival at Acre on the 12th of October.3
He died there about the 20th of November, but the news did not
reach England before March 1191. The only matter of interest
mentioned by Gervase or referred to in these letters, during this
interval, was a dispute as to the consecration of William elect of
Worcester and Geoffrey of York. The details differ little from those
of the hundreds of similar squabbles in which the convent engaged
on the question. In the former case they were successful ; in the
latter they were defeated.4

The men whom Richard placed at the helm of ecclesiastical Richard's
affairs were, with one exception, those who as lawyers or ministers u
had been the faithful servants of his father, but whom Henry,
recollecting his sad experience with S. Thomas, had refused to reward
with the episcopal dignity.5 It may be said of them all, that how-
ever they came by their promotion, their use of it was wise and
pure.6 Hubert Walter, the new bishop of Salisbury, was a man who
set himself to do what his hand found to do with all his might. As
a bishop, a soldier, a lawyer, or a statesman, he came up fully to the
standard of his time. Of the others, Richard of London was a
famous organiser in the business of the treasurership ; and he, as
well as Godfrey de Lucy of Winchester, was a good average bishop.
Of the older prelates, Hugh of Puiset was as ambitious and bustling
as he had been forty years before ; Hugh of Lincoln kept as much as
possible out of the affairs of state ; Reginald of Bath was quietly
laying his plans for the primacy.

That Richard began his reign by imprisoning two of his father's

1 Gerv. 1564. Nos. cccxliii. cccxliv. reason given in the text. The same

2 No. cccxxxvii. Fcedera, i. 51. year Hubert Walter had been elected

3 No. cccxlv. archbishop of York, but was set aside

4 Nos. cccxxxviii.— cccxliv. by the king. Godfrey le Lucy had re-

5 In 1186, Godfrey de Lucy, Richard fused Exeter. Benedict. Peterb. ad
FitzNeal, and Herbert le Poor had annum.

been nominated by the canons of 6 For the character of Richard Fitz-

Lincoln for the vacant see in 1186, but Neal, see Ann. Winton., Ang. Sac. i.
Henry refused his consent for the 304.

412

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

Richard'*
trratnuMit
of Kannlf

GlRIIVill

William
Longcbamp

William
Ixmg-

cliamp'g
difficulties

ministers, Hanulf Glanvilland Stephen de Marzai,1 is alleged by one
or two trustworthy historians. We are left in ignorance of the real
cause of this harsh treatment of these men, unless we follow the belief
of the chroniclers that it was for the purpose of extortion. It is
possible that Ranulf Glanvill was suspected of too great attachment
to John, whose guardian he had been, and in whose favour Henry
was said to meditate the disinheriting of his elder son. Whatever
the cause, the imprisonment was short, and both the obnoxious
ministers were promoted to important commands in the crusade.
The king showed no further mistrust of his father's servants.

The one exception to the rule, the one new man who came on
the stage of politics at Richard's accession, was William of Long-
champ, bishop of Ely.2 Of this prelate such contradictory char-
acters have been drawn, that is impossible to say whether he was a
hero or a mere unprincipled adventurer. In the latter light he was
regarded by Hugh of Puiset, by the followers of Geoffrey and John,
and probably by the majority of Norman nobles. By the monks
and their friends he is spoken of as a pious and conscientious
man. Of his public policy it may be fairly said that no legal
charge was ever brought against him ; that his enemies were in all
cases the enemies of his master ; that his designs were actually
followed up by his rivals when they attained to power. He was
doubtless an upstart ; probably a clever and not very scrupulous
politician ; possibly a person of haughty, supercilious demeanour.
But the greatness of his position was enough to draw upon him a
great deal of odium. Few men have ever wielded the power that
was placed in his hands by the king and primate when they left

' Richard of Devizes, pp. 6, 7. If
the statement depended only on the
testimony of this ill-natured historian,
it might be considered doubtful ; for he
never misses an opportunity of speak-
ing ill of anyone, and here he has a
hit at all the three parties. Benedict
of Peterborough mentions the deposi-
tion of Glanvill from the justiciarship
after the coronation, and the manner
in which Richard made all the officials
in the kingdom repurchase their
places : the fine levied on Stephen was
30,000 pounds Angevin down, and a
promise of 15,000 more. The Angevin
• pound ' was a quarter of the English.
Ranulf's fine was 15,000 pounds of
silver (R. Devizes, 7). These were
both very heavy fines if we consider
that the price of the chancellorship
was 3,0()0 pounds when William of
Longchamp bought it ; possibly, how-
ever, Richard let him have it cheap, as

we know he refused an offer of 4,000
from Reginaldus Italus. Of the fact
of the exaction I have no doubt, but
of the imprisonment there is less cer-
tainty. It can have continued, if real,
only a very short time ; and when we
next meet with Ranulf and Stephen, it
is in places of honour. Stephen de
Turnham, who fought in the crusade
with Richard, seems to be the same
person with Stephen de Marzai.
\Villiam of Newburgh tells a wonder-
ful fortune- telling story about him.
Lib. v. c. 6.

1 A good character is given to Long-
champ by the monks of Winchester,
Ang. Sac. i. 302 ; and by those of
Canterbury, p. 538, vol. R. S. ; Nigel
Wireker; Peter of Blois; Ang. Sac. i.
632. A bad one by Giraldus Cam-
brensis, Hugh of Nunant, William of
Newburgb, Richard of Devizes.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

413

England ; the combined burden of the legatine office l and the chan-
cellorship proved a few years later too great for Hubert Walter, who
was a comparatively popular minister ; and the position of William
Longchamp was made still more invidious by the absence of the king.
It was by the manoeuvres of John 2 and Geoffrey that he was over-
thrown ; he must be credited at least with the merit of faithful
service.

When in March 1191 the rumour of the death of Baldwin reached Deposition
the convent, they immediately petitioned the king for a free election.3 osber°r
If they had any expectation that their prayer would be granted, they
were speedily undeceived, for on the 6th of May was delivered the
king's letter from Messina ordering them to postulate William, arch-
bishop of Montreal.4 Their first thought, however, was not whom to
elect as archbishop, but how to get rid of Prior Osbert, who, although
a man of very different character from Koger Norreys, was hardly
less a creature of the late archbishop, and equally obnoxious to the
extreme party. The certainty of Baldwin's death inspired the monks
with courage ; in a vacancy of the see they possessed the undoubted
right of electing their own prior. It is uncertain when or how the
subprior Geoffrey had returned from exile. We find him at Canter-
bury on the 10th of May.5 On that day, four days after the receipt

1 He was appointed legate by Cle-
ment III., June 5, 1190. On Clement's
death his legation seems to have ex-
pired, and he applied for renewal to
Celestine III., shortly before his down-
fall ; Ben. Peterb. ii. 693, ed. Hearne.
He ceases after the news of the death
of Clement, who died March 27, 1191,
to call himself legate. It does not
appear when Celestine renewed the
legation, but it was evidently before
Dec. 2, on which day Celestine names
him legate in a letter to the prelates.
Hoveden, 402. Cf. W. Newburgh, iv.
18. He could hardly have been
treated as he was by the archbishop of
Rouen if he had been recognised as
legate at the time of his deposition.
The letter of July 30, given by Giraldus
(Ang. Sac. ii. 390), seems to be op-
posed to this, but it may not be an
exact copy ; and in the letter of Aug.
25 the title is omitted. His conse-
cration of the bishop of Worcester
on the 5th of May must have been
about his last legatine act. Pope
Clement IV. decreed that the legation
did not expire at the death of the pope.
VI. Deer. i. tit. xv. c. 2.

2 The immediate cause of William's

overthrow was the imprisonment of
Archbishop Geoffrey of York at Dover,
by his creatures. Gerv. 1576. There
can be little doubt that the act was
one of indiscreet zeal on their part ;
but it is a curious question where the
chancellor was at the time. The writ
for the apprehension of Geoffrey is
dated ' apud Preston, xxx. die Julii.'
Gir. Camb., Anglia Sacra, ii. 390.
The prohibition to Walter of Rouen to
visit Canterbury is dated ' apud Rele-
iam, xxv. dieAugusti,' ib.p. 395. The
letter of excuse for the arrest (No.
ccclxxi.) is dated Sept. 29th, 'apud
Bromd.' It was at Norwich that the
bishops of London and Norwich up-
braided him with his conduct in the
matter ; Gir. Camb., A. S. ii. 392. He
then went to London (p. 394), and
thence to Windsor ; from which place
he went to the colloquy at Lodbridge
on the 5th of October. ' Bromd,' in
No. ccclxxi., must, therefore, be some-
where between Norwich and London.
The struggle closed on Oct. 10.

3 No. cccli. Gervase, 1567.

4 Nos. cccxlviii. cccliv. Gervase,
1568.

5 No. cccliv. Gervase, 1570.

414

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

Geoffrey
made prior

William
Longchamp
a candidate
for the
primacy

of the royal letter, the brethren under Geoffrey's guidance demanded
the dismissal of Felix the cellarer, Robert the doctor, and Zacharias,
an unfaithful monk. Prior Osbert was unable to make any resistance.
Having assented to the act, he imprudently asked, ' Are there more ? '
' You yourself,' was the ready answer, ' must resign the priorate.'
Osbert behaved with some little dignity. He rose and said, ' Hear
me, sirs, as you would have God hear you. You know how well and
firmly I stood by you in your troubles, for which I was excom-
municated by the archbishop and suffered much hardship. When by
the counsel of certain great persons and of some of the brethren I
quitted you for the archbishop, I always exercised my influence for
your good, never for your harm. When I was made prior, at the
archbishop's command and with the royal assent, no voice from the
convent was raised against me. 1 thought until to-day that I had
your assent as well. God knows that if I had not thought so I
would never have taken either the priorate or any other office upon
me. As it is I will not hold it against your good pleasure.' The
seniors accepted this as a resignation, and the subprior was dragged
into the prior's chair. Little notice was taken by the legate chancellor,
for the best of reasons. The convent would certainly have a voice in
the election of the archbishop, and William Longchamp intended the
choice to fall upon himself.1

There can be little doubt, if the few letters that passed between
the convent and the legate may be depended upon, that had the
election been free the monks would have elected him. There were
many points in his favour. He was already at the head of a chapter
of monks and on friendly terms with them. His enemies were the
old enemies of the convent, the worldly clerks, and unprincipled
ministers of Henry. He himself was or seemed to be high in the
favour of both king and pope. Nigel the poet was an intimate
friend and admirer of William, and he was one of the most able men
in the convent.2

1 See No. ccclxxiv. Jocclin of
Brakelond says of Longchamp (p.
38), ' Dicebfttur olfacere archiepisco-
patum ; ' see also W. Newburgh, iv.
18.

* Nigel Wireker, as he is generally
called, was one of the best mediaeval
poets : see Leyser, Hist. Poematum
Medii JKvi, p. 751 ; Wright, Bio-
graphia Brit. Lit. pp. 351, Ac. In a
copy of some of his poems in the
Cotton MS. Vesp. D. xix. he is styled,
in a hand of the fourteenth century,
' Nigellus de Longo Campo.' It is un-
certain whether this is a simple mis-
take arising from his connexion with

William, to whom he dedicates his
Speculum EcclesicE, orDeAbufueccle-
siastico, and some of his poems, per-
haps also the Speculum Stultorum ;
more probably they were either rela-
tions or fellow- townsmen. There is
one letter in this series which may
have been written by him, No. cccxxii.
The rir quidam magnus in this letter
may have been the future chancellor :
the second of the four lines with
which the letter ends, ' Maxima pars
nostri, dimidiumque mei, ' bears a
strong likeness to the fourth line of
the dedication of the Speculum Stul-
torum, ' Maxima pars animaa, dirai-

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 415

Other heads, however, were at work to prevent this. Foremost Waiter of
there was the archbishop of Eouen, who had been sent over by the brings the
king with the commission of justiciar,1 with especial directions as to manasC°E
the election of the primate. Walter of Coutances was an ambitious
man, and would gladly have accepted the translation for himself.
William Longchamp prevented him from visiting Canterbury as long
as he remained in power,2 and until he could do so the king's
pleasure could not be known or the election proceeded with. It can
never be certainly known why Eichard nominated William of Mont-
real ; the influence of his sister, Queen Joanna, whose husband,
William of Sicily, had greatly trusted and promoted him, may have'
been used in his favour ; possibly Kichard thought that by appointing
him he might prevent the primacy from becoming a bone of conten-
tion among the greedy courtiers at home. Possibly the recommenda-
tion was bought and paid for, but never intended to be carried out.
No effort was made to effect the promotion of the archbishop of
Montreal, who was probably dead before the day of election.

Reginald Fitz Jocelin,3 bishop of Bath, had stood by the convent The bishop
in their troubles more faithfully than any other prelate, although he Reginald
had never gone so far as to imperil his own position. He had power- Fltz Jocelm
ful friends and an unwearied agent in his kinsman Savaric, archdeacon
of Northampton, who called himself cousin of the Roman emperor.4

diumque me® ' ; it is possible, how- bow from the king's servants in a forest

ever, that this may be a quotation in Surrey (Madox, Hist. Exch. p. 390).

in both cases from some other poet. He was probably made treasurer of

The French words that precede it, Salisbury by his cousin Jocelin de

' Cine cenz deehez ait il, ki pur Bohun before 1184, and held also the

archeveske u pur celerier a cose archdeaconry of Northampton, the

revan [?],' mean ' Five hundred plagues revenues of which were sequestered in

have he, who for archbishop or for 1186 for the payment of his debts,

cellarer has husked bran ' : but it is On Richard's accession he followed

not clear in what signification they him to Sicily, where he obtained a

were spoken. letter to the justiciars, giving the royal

1 On this see Sir F. Palgrave, assent for his admission to any
preface to ' Rotuli Curias Regis,' vol. i. bishopric to which he might be elected ;
pp. Ix, &c. and this he got confirmed by the

2 No. dlxvi. pope. Having taken a prominent part

3 Reginald Fitz Jocelin was the son in securing the election of Reginald
of Jocelin de Bohun, bishop of Salis- Fitz Jocelin, he succeeded him as
bury ; he was brought up in Lombardy bishop of Bath and Wells, and was
(Herb. Bosham, vii. 1), and hence consecrated at Rome in 1192. During
bore the name Reginald Lumbardus ; Richard's captivity he visited him and
he is probably also the Reginaldus got two letters from him, recommend-
Italus who, according to Richard of ing him for the see of Canterbury. In
Devizes (p. 9), offered Richard 4,000 1196 he was chancellor of Burgundy
pounds for the chancellorship. under Henry VI. (Hoveden, 420).

4 Savaric is a person whose career, After Henry's death he seems to have
if it could be explored, must havelbeen returned to England, and spent the
very interesting. His first appearance rest of his life in his contest with
is in the 18th of Henry II., when he the monks of Glastonbury. He died
was fined 26Z. 4s. id. for trying to take a in 1205, and was described in his

41G

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

Reginald's
testimonial!)

Proceeding*
in the
election of
archbishop

He forwarded letters to Canterbury from both Philip of France and
Henry VI., recommending them to take the advice of Savaric and
elect a faithful friend whom he would recommend to them, and
whom they could easily recognise by that description. These letters
were not without effect.1

As soon as Walter of Coutances and Earl John had expelled the
chancellor from the country, they hurried on the election of archbishop.
The monks were summoned to London for the 22nd of October.2

epitaph, 'Hospes eras mundo, per
niunduin semper eundo, Sic suprema
dies fit tibi prima quies.' Godwin,
De Prcesulibus, 370. The following
account of his lineage may afford
some clue to the nature of his relation-
ship to the emperor, the fact of which
is certain, although the exact degree
is not yet known. On his father's
side the pedigree is as follows. In
the early part of the eleventh century
one Savaric was viscount of Le Mans.
He was succeeded by his brother
Ralph, lord of Beaumont and S. Su-
zanne, who was twice married : 1, to
Emma, niece of Hubert, bishop of
Angers, who bore him Hubert, his
successor. Hubert married Ermen-
gard, daughter of William, count of
Nevers, by whom he had two sons,
Ralph and Hubert, and a daughter,
Godechildis ; from the eldest son the
viscounts of Beaumont were descended.
2. Ralph's second wife was Ghana,
daughter of Geldewin, lord of Saumur,
by his wife Aanordis. Ghana had
been married before to Frangalus,
lord of Fougeres, by whom she had
children. By Hubert she had Savaric
Fitz Chane, who succeeded to the
estates in England conferred by the
Conqueror, or William Rufus, on his
uncle Goffred, lord of Chaumont.
Savaric Fitz Chane had three sons,
Ralph, Savaric, and Geldewin. Ralph
and Savaric died childless. Geldewin
married a lady named Estrangia, by
whom he had Savaric, bishop of Bath
and Wells, and Franco de Bohun,
who died in 1192. (Ann. Waverley,
p. 164.) Estrangia may have been a
German lady ; the name of Franco, or
Francus, may point to a Franconian
origin. The relation between Savaric
and Reginald Fitz Jocelin is also
obscure. Humfrey I. de Bohun had
three sons : Robert, who died s. p. ;
Humfrey, who was the ancestor of
the Bohuns of Hereford ; and Richard

de Meri. Richard de Men made his
heir Engelger, a noble of the Cotentin,
who was almost certainly his son-in-
law. This Engelger had a son, En-
gelger II. who married Adeliza,
daughter of Count Stephen of Aumale,
and was living to nearly 1180. He
is called by William Fitz Stephen, p.
290, the ' patruus ' of Jocelin, bishop
of Salisbury, who and his brother
Richard de Bohun, bishop of Cou-
tances, may have been sons of Alex-
ander, son of Engelger I. ; but were
more probably brothers than nephews
of Engelger II. The heir of Engelger
II. was Savaric Fitz Savaric, and after
him Franco, the son of Geldewin, who
thus became Franco de Bohun. En-
gelger II. must have been too young
to be grandfather to Savaric Fitz
Savaric, and could not have been
father-in-law, or the inheritance would
not have descended to Franco. It
would seem, therefore, most probable
that Savaric Fitz Chane married
another daughter of Richard de Meri,
and that on the default of issue to
the Engelgers, his great-grandchildren
came in as heirs to the Bohuns of
Midhurst. The estates of the Bohuns
were in Sussex, where lay also those
of Albini and Percy, who were con-
nected with the dukes of Louvain. It
was probably on the side of his Bur-
gundian mother that Henry VI. was
connected with his Burgundian chan-
cellor. The authorities for the fore-
going statements are Staple ton's pre-
face to the Rolls of the Norman Ex-
chequer, ii. p. 31, &c. and the Chro-
nicles in Mart, et Dur. Amplissima
Collectio, i. 439 ; Dachery, Spicilegium,
iii. 277 ; and Ordericus Vitalis.

1 Nos. ccclxxxi. ccclxxxii.

1 The summons to the monks was
issued on the 10th of October, the very
day of the chancellor's deposition,
No. ccclxxvii.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 417

They attended accordingly. The prior was asked whether he would
accept the nomination of William of Montreal. Geoffrey declared
that it was unworthy of the English Church to go begging for a
foreigner when the realm was so full of able clerks, but declined
giving a decided answer until he had had time for consideration and
prayer. Having been thanked by the justiciars, who never intended
to elect the archbishop of Montreal, he returned home.1 A second
letter was now issued in the king's name ; the justiciars would
attend at Canterbury on the 3rd of December to complete the elec-
tion. Nearly a week before the day appointed the justiciars and some
of the bishops arrived, and by so doing roused the suspicion of the
prior, who remembered that the suffragans had succeeded in forcing
Archbishop Baldwin upon the convent. He tried, therefore, to sound
the chief justiciar as to who would be accepted by the king. Walter,
as Gervase hints,2 intended the monks to choose himself ; he must,
if so, have failed either to express himself intelligibly or to convince
the prior of his merits. ' Would the bishop of Bath be admissible ? '
The archbishop did not say Yes, but the monks interpreted his looks The bishop
as favourable. 'We elect,' cried the prior, 'the bishop of Bath.' elected to
The monks re-echoed the nomination, and, laying violent hands on the rnr
Reginald, thrust him into the archiepiscopal chair.^ The archbishop
of Rouen retired in alarm to London, and, having called together the
nobles, in their presence demanded of the bishop whether he was
prepared to abide by the election. Reginald declared that he would,
and defended the legality of the proceeding . The prior was also pre-
sent and refused to retract a step. Further proceedings were
threatened by the ministers, and for the first time the deposition of
Prior Osbert was bought forward. The death of Reginald, within a Death of
month of the election, settled speedily the more important question. 1
Queen Eleanor's protection was invoked by the convent, and the
matter of Osbert was soon forgotten in more pressing troubles.
Reginald was seized with paralysis or apoplexy on Christmas Eve at
Dogmersfield, and died on S. Stephen's day.4 The monastic habit
for which he had sent to Canterbury did not arrive until he had
breathed his last. The convent lamented a faithful and powerful
friend. He was buried on the feast of S. Thomas.

The year 1192 is almost a blank in the history of the convent. The A new eiec-
state of the country was not such as to suffer them to attempt an elec- Richard1"8
tion : the news from the Holy Land was scanty and uncertain. Richard IS^01
was taken prisoner at Vienna on the 12th of December. After three
months' captivity he wrote to the convent, directing them to take the

1 Gervase, 1-578. No. ccclxxxvi. 3 Gervase, 1-580.

- ' Spe fraudatus.' Gervase, 1580. " Gervase, 1580. Pet. Bles. ep. 216.

E E

418

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

Hubert
Walter
elected
archbishop

Demolition
of Baldwin'?
college

advice of William of S. Mere 1'Eglise in their choice of a new arch-
bishop ; at the same time he wrote to his mother and to the justiciars
to secure the election of Hubert Walter.1 He was sorely pressed at
this time ; the indefatigable Savaric, who had become bishop of
Bath, was now a candidate on his own account ; the imperial relation-
ship was brought to bear upon Richard, who wrote two letters to the
convent in his favour.2 William Longchamp also got a letter from
the king, and so, perhaps, did some others.3 The real choice of the
captive prince was undoubtedly Hubert, in whose favour he wrote
pressing letters both to the convent and to Queen Eleanor. Hubert
was elected without much delay 4 on the 80th of May. Strange to
say, two months after the election was over, a letter was brought
from the king, dated July 10, forbidding the convent to elect him.
It is hard to say what this meant : 5 the letter may have been ex-
torted from the king by the influence of those about him, to which,
as he complains to his mother, he is compelled to seem to yield.
The election was by this time perfected, and Hubert busily engaged
in reducing the kingdom to order and in procuring the king's
release.

We have now to return to the old question of the college of clerks.
Prior Osbert,6 shortly before his deposition, had sent to Rome
for an injunction for the destruction of the remaining buildings at
Hakington, for the confirmation of the secret act of John of Anagni,
and the renewal of the mandates of popes Urban and Clement. These
were readily granted by the pope Celestine III., who had succeeded
Clement III. in the spring of 1191. The bishop of Bath and the
abbots of Reading and Walthain were the delegates for executing the
mandates.7 The buildings were finally demolished, but the chan-
cellor interfered to prevent the ejection of the clerks from the four
disputed churches. The chapel of Hakington was destroyed on the
21st of July." Reginald's participation in this act helped to endear

1 Nos. cccxcix. ccco. cccci.

* No. cccci i.

1 No. occciii. Gervase, 1583.

4 The monks anticipated the elec-
tion of Hubert by the bishops, by
electing him themselves before the
day appointed. Gervase, 1584.

4 Giraldus (Opp. ed. Brewer, iii. 19),
who hated Hubert, declared that he
obtained the election by unfair means.
• Nisi ciiini rex Ricardus in Alemannia
detentus fuisst-t, et ibi multipliciter
in careers circumventus, longe aliter
proculdubio Anglicana ecclesiae pro-
vidisset.' The appointment of Hubert
must have been arranged between
himself and Richard at Spires : for

the management of it is intrusted to
William of 8. Mere 1'Eglise, who
accompanied Hubert on his visit to
the captive king. Hoveden, 413.

• No. cccl.

T Nos. ccclvi. ccclvii. ccclviii. A
month later Celestine renewed the
privilege granted by Urban III. to the
convent, which appears as No. zlvi.
in the volume (Rolls Series). As the
privilege of Celestine is word for word
the same as that of Urban, I have not
thought it worth while to put it into
the Appendix, R. S. It is dated June
20, 1191, S. Peter's; and is printed by
Wilkins in the Concilia, i. 524.

• Gervase, 1572-3.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 419

him to the convent, and added a new claim to the many he already
possessed to the primacy.

The fears of the monks were now directed to another quarter. The The Lam-
original privilege by which Urban III. had permitted Baldwin to
found his college had specified Lambeth as one of the places where
it might be settled. The manor of Lambeth was the property of the
convent of Rochester, to which it had come by royal gift soon after
the Conquest. The archbishops of Canterbury had been the tenants
of the manor-house since the time of Anselm, who had ordained in
the chapel and held a council there in 1100. His two successors
used the chapel for the consecration of bishops. Archbishop Thao-
bald seems to have made some arrangement with the owners, which
ended in the house being recognised as the town residence of the
primates,1 and for this reason doubtless it was named by Pope Urban.
The archbishop did not, however, possess any part of the estate until
the year 1190, when, as was mentioned above,2 Baldwin acquired
twenty-four acres of the demesne of the manor in exchange for
land in the Isle of Grain, with the express intention of founding a
church of canons. The parish church of Lambeth and the manor
itself were not acquired until some years later.

On this piece of ground the foundations were laid before Arch-
bishop Baldwin sailed,3 but owing to the want of his presence and
support the scheme languished. The buildings had, however, in 1192
attained such dimensions as to offend the convent of Canterbury. In
the May of that year a mandate was procured from Eome, directing
the bishop of Chichester and the abbots of Waltham and Beading to
release the canons of Lambeth from the oath they had taken to the ceiestine IT:
late archbishop, and to close the church.4 It seems probable that dissolution
the canons appealed against this sentence, for there is a bull of Pope ilmbeth
Celestine III., of January 30, 1193,5 in which he takes them and college
their lawful possessions under the care of the Holy See.

Matters were in this state when Hubert was elected. He received Hubert's
the archiepiscopal cross from Gervase, now become the sacrist,6 at the'sche°me
Lewisham on the 3rd of November, and the pall at Canterbury on
the 7th. In the first year of his pontificate the convent held their
courts as in former times ; although the affair was now becoming
urgent, not a word had been spoken about it. Hubert was the

1 Ann. Roffenses, Ang. Sac. i. 344. that the estate was managed as a cell

This may, however, refer only to under a ' prior de Lammedhe.' Mon.

Theobald's settlement of a dispute Angl. i. 177.
between the bishop of Rochester and z P. 411. Fredera, i. 51.

the convent on the ownership of the :t Gervase, 1564.

manor. It would seem, from the act ' No. cccxcvii.

of exchange of the manor between 5 No. cccxcvi.

Hubert and the convent of Rochester, u Gervase, 1585.

E E 2

420 MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICH Alt I > I.

intimate friend of Baldwin and the executor of his will ; he had been
himself one of the canons of Hakington, and may have felt some
resentment for the extinction of that design, but this would hardly
have led him into a new dispute if he had not been pressed by his
old friends the clerks. With a view of compromising matters, he
offered to remove the college to Maidstone, and build there on the
estate of the convent.1 But to this plan the monks would not listen ;
the original intention was therefore reverted to. In 1196 Gervase
records that the monks remonstrated with the archbishop. After a
long conversation, in which the historian himself probably took a
leading part, and in which the history of the former controversy was
reviewed, the archbishop honestly declared that, sorry as he might
be to act in opposition to the church which had placed him at its
head, he could not for his own honour's sake leave imperfect the
work that he had begun. The two parties separated with the expressed
intention of seeking divine counsel by prayer.2

outbreak The new storm broke in 1197. On Christmas Day 1196 the

q!m?re?ew archbishop visited Canterbury, but was prevented by illness from
taking part in the service. After his recovery, on the 21st of January,
he had a conference with the convent in the chapter-house ; his own
clerks were excluded, and his cross was carried by John of Dover,
one of the monks.3 The discussion lasted for three days, and the
result was kept a profound secret. We may guess almost to a certainty
at one subject of consideration. Hubert had already arranged for
Acquisition the acquisition to his see of the manor of Lambeth. As early as
of Lambeth April 7, 1195,4 and again June 18, 1196, the king had confirmed an
exchange, between Hubert and the church of Rochester, of Darenth
for Lambeth.5 It was most probably on this occasion that the
archbishop first tried to secure the assent of the convent to the
completion of Baldwin's design. Although we cannot suppose that
he succeeded in this, he must either have lulled the suspicious
watchfulness of Prior Geoffrey, or have miscalculated the strength
of the old feeling in the convent. He proceeded in April, 1197, to
perfect the exchange, which was again confirmed by the king,6 and
on the conclusion of the bargain he sent an envoy to Rome to obtain
the countenance of Celestine III. The pope, who was far beyond
ninety, was growing very infirm, and had, perhaps, forgotten the
part that in former days he had taken on the side of the monks.
Hubert at any rate procured from him a letter which placed the
collegiate church of S. Stephen and S. Thomas at Lambeth in his
hands.7 He was now lord of the manor of Lambeth, and had by

1 Gervase, 1593. 4 Fcedera, i. 66. * No. dlxvi.

J Gervase, 1595. • No. dlxvii. Oervaae, 1597.

1 B. de Diceto, 696. ' No. ccccxiii.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 421

the common law the right to build a religious house of any order
he chose upon his own estate.

He was called away from England on the 17th of June,1 long Hubert
before the arrival of Celestine's grant, and remained on the continent certain*
until the 3rd of November.2 On his return he took up the business Se^ri^
immediately. After paying a visit in person to the convent, he sent, churoh8*
on the 16th, the abbots of Chertsey, Waltham, and Beading with
new proposals/5 The envoys declared that their purpose was not
to ask the consent of the monks to the foundation of the college
of Lambeth, that was not required, but to lay before them the scheme
which the archbishop had drawn up for the securing of their rights.
The principal points of this scheme were these : every newly-appointed
canon should swear that he would never attempt to assert for the
college any voice in the election of the archbishop ; that he would
not connive at the translation of S. Thomas to any other church ;
that he would not consent to the consecration of the chrism else-
where than at Canterbury ; he would never seek or suffer another
to seek relief from this oath. Every canon should be installed in
propria persona, and immediately after his installation should go
to Canterbury and take this oath, under pain of privation. The
prior of Christ Church should hold a prebendal stall at Lambeth,
and be present at all chapters in the habit of a canon. To these
conditions the archbishop was prepared to secure the consent of both
king and pope.4

The answer of the monks to this offer was conveyed by one of
their own body, probably Gervase again ; they professed the utmost
affection for Hubert, but positively refused to consent to his design ; The convent
as for the securities he offered, they would take the advice of their proposal"
friends.5

The archbishop visited Canterbury again early in the next year
to receive the deliberate answer of the convent to his proposals. The
allegations which the monks brought forward in reply were probably
those embodied in the very curious memorial with which our MS.
closes, and which is unfortunately imperfect. They amount to a
downright refusal. Hubert then proposed that the Holy See should Both parties
be consulted by both parties, on the strict understanding that neither consult the
should apply for any mandate without the knowledge of the other- p
The monks assented in words ; and the archbishop left them,

1 Gervase, 1597. was the second time these propositions

2 Gervase, 1598. R. de Diceto says were made : Hubert sent them first
that he returned on the 8th, having by John of Dover, and afterwards
been absent twenty weeks and six days. summoned the monks to Coventry for

3 Gervase, 1598. Nos. ccccxxvii. their answer. No. cccclxv.
ccccxxviii. 5 Gervp.se, 1599. The answer was

1 No. dlvi. Gervase, 1598. This given on the 17th.

422

MEMORIALS OF THE RKKiN OF UJCIIAK1) 1.

Two monks
go secretly
to Rome

Hnbert
excommu-
nicates the
f natives

Tbe Prior
Geoffrey

First man-
date of
Innocent I II.

Bnberl
appeals
against tbe

deceived, according to Gervase, by their mild speeches ; for their
envoys were already on the way to Rome.

Geoffrey was still prior ; but he seems to have lost Rome of his
earlier energy, or else to have considered the propositions of the
archbishop not unreasonable. Two of the brethren, who looked upon
him as dilatory or lukewarm in the cause, had left the convent
secretly early in January, and proceeded to Rome to lay their case
before Pope Celestine.

On hearing of the gross deception that had been practised upon
him, Hubert was very angry, and came down to Canterbury to make
inquiry. The prior answered that the monks had left without his
permission, and produced a letter from the delinquents confessing
their offence, and appealing to the Holy See against the archbishop.
Hubert, having a strong suspicion of collusion, excommunicated the
fugitives in spite of their appeal. It is not very easy to say what
share the prior had in the transaction. Perhaps if he had been left
to himself he might at this time have agreed with the archbishop ;
but the precedent which he had created against himself by the
deposition of Osbert was a dangerous one ; it would be fatal to him
to be suspected of a deficiency of zeal ; his hesitation, if hesitation
there was, was but for a moment. It is more charitable to suppose
that such was the case than to assume that he actually connived at
the deceiving of the archbishop.1

The result of the manoeuvre was not long delayed. The two
brethren found when they reached Rome that Celestine was dead ;
that his successor, Innocent III., was their old friend, the lord
Lothair. Their business was expedited at once. Without waiting
to hear the representations of Hubert, Innocent, on the 24th of April,
issued a letter to him, insisting on the demolition and abolition of
the college within thirty days,2 on pain of suspension, and accom-
panied it with an injunction to the suffragan bishops to withdraw
their obedience in case of his refusal. This was granted on the
hearing of one party only, but in dependence on the mandates of
Urban, Clement, and Celestine.

The news of the issue of these letters reached Lambeth, where
Hubert was staying, on the 81st of May.3 After a sleepless night,

1 Gervase (1601) defends tbe decep-
tion practised by tbe monks on tbe
grounds that the archbishop had
already sent messengers with a great
supply of money to Borne. It is
probable that Hubert had agents
generally at Rome ; but the whole
tenor of the succeeding controversy
shows that he had acted in good
faith on this occasion. In fact, he

believed himself to have power to do
nil that he wanted in the matter ; and
even if he did send an agent to ob-
struct any petitions the convent might
make, it was no more than he had a
right to do on tbe terms of tbe agree-
ment.

* Nos. ccccxxxiv. ccccxxxv.

1 No. ccccl. Gel-vase. IfiOl.

MEMORIALS OF THE KEIGN OF RICHARD I. 423

he called together his advisers early the next morning, and in their
presence appealed against the mandate as obtained under false pre-
tences ; the bishop of Rochester joined in the appeal, and Symon,
archdeacon of Wells, also appealed on behalf of the canons. Hubert
then proceeded to send the abbots of Chertsey and Waltham to Heremou-
Canterbury with a letter of remonstrance, and a strict command that Leoonvent
the monks should write a true statement of the whole case to
Innocent.

The convent demanded time for consideration before answering, The man-
and in the meanwhile sent four monks to serve the obnoxious letters ^rvedou
on the archbishop. They arrived at Lambeth on the 7th of June, ^Wng1""1'
but were kept waiting two days before they were suffered to execute
their office. The information had now reached the king in Nor-
mandy, and provoked him to great indignation. He immediately
prohibited the archbishop from obeying the mandate, and wrote to
the pope and cardinals, protesting vigorously against so monstrous
an invasion of English liberties in Church and State.

Hubert had already summoned the bishops to Canterbury to the council of
consecration of Geoffrey Muschamp, elect of Coventry, which was and at- °ps>
fixed for the 21st. He himself arrived there on the 19th. On the 20th
he visited the convent, and complained bitterly of the ill faith of the
prior. On the Monday after the consecration the abbots of Waltham,
Chertsey, and Reading again appeared as his messengers ; with them
came several of the bishops, and Geoffrey Fitz Peter and Hugh
Bardolf, on the part of the king. These produced a letter from
Richard, in which he forbade the execution of the mandate, and
himself appealed against it, at the same time taking the college at
Lambeth under royal protection, and summoning the prior to account
for the offence against the liberties of the realm. When this had
been read, the archbishop appeared in person, and tried by persuasion
to prevail on the monks to renounce the papal sentence, and to
accept an arbitration. Finding all argument useless, he left Canter-
bury in disgust on the 23rd, and directly on his departure the royal
officers entered on the possessions of the convent. This first occupa-
tion lasted only a few days, and was withdrawn at the archbishop's
request.

Both parties now sent accredited messengers to Rome. Hubert, The
in the simplicity of his heart, furnished his with a load of the relics
of SS. Albinus and Rufinus ; ' not neglecting, however, to send a
great treasure of ready money with them. His envoys were the
Cistercian abbots of Boxley and Robertsbridge, who had already

1 Honorius had before taken a to Rome to work upon the feelings of
quantity of the relics of these saints Pope Clement. No. ccxxxiv.

424

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

The king
Insists on an

a rbit ration

Hubert in
Wales

Hubert
surrenders
his justiciar-

Fllip

Richard
sends to
enrol the
treasure of
the ehnrch

attempted to act as mediators.1 They were furnished with letters in
defence of the archbishop from all the suffragans of the province,
and from the Cistercian abbots of England.

Although Hubert deemed it wise to appear at Rome by his
agents, he could foresee the sentence of the pope, and was not inclined
to acquiesce in it. He devoted himself, therefore, to another attempt
to persuade or to compel the convent to a compromise. He again
applied to the king, who issued a letter on the 23rd of July, ordering
the convent to choose five bishops and five abbots as arbiters.9 The
prior refused on the old grounds, that as all the prelates in England
were committed to the design of Hubert, no fair arbitration could be
obtained.

The month of August passed away without any alteration in the
position of parties, the archbishop being called away by the war on
the Welsh marches,3 and no new mandates being received from
Rome. Hubert was employed further in surrendering the justiciar-
ship, which, according to Hoveden and Matthew Paris, the pope, at
the suggestion of the monks, had forbidden him to retain. It is
curious that not a word on this subject is found in the present
volume. If it were not for the strong contemporary evidence, the
statement would seem improbable ; as it is, we must suppose that
the allegations were made by word of mouth, or the letters containing
them were destroyed, as dangerous documents, should they fall into
the hands of either Hubert or the king. In the midst of business,
however, the archbishop found time to send for the third time to
Canterbury the schedule of cautions with which he was prepared to
secure the status of the mother church in case the new foundation
should take effect.

Richard was not disposed to let matters rest even for a time.
The treasures of the church had not been exhausted by his ransom ;
sufficient yet remained to swell considerably the hoard he was laying
up in France, and this he would not suffer to flow into the pockets
of the Roman courtiers. He renewed the struggle early in September
by a command addressed to the justiciars to visit Canterbury and
make an inventory of the treasures of the convent.4 This was to be
followed by a similar visitation of the other cathedral monasteries.5
The visit was paid on the 26th of September ; 6 the royal officers

1 Gervase, 1606.

7 No. cccclxx. Gervase, 1608.

* Gervase, 1614. The archbishop
defeated the Welsh in a great battle
at Payn's Castle a few days after the
death of Peter, bishop of S. David's,
which happened on July 16. Giraldus,
Opp. i. pp. <J5 96 He then returned

to London, and surrendered the jus-
ticiarship, to which Geoffrey Fitz
Peter succeeded in August. The
writ by which the king relieved Hu-
bert from his office is dated July 11.
Fuedera, i. 71.

4 No. cccclxv. * No. cccclxxiv.

• Gervase, 1614, 1680.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 425

presented themselves in company with Henry of Castillon, archdeacon
of Canterbury, and the abbot of Faversham, on the part of the arch-
bishop. The prior stoutly refused to suffer the treasure to be seen
by profane eyes ; the envoys did not choose to use force, but departed
as they came. The refusal was an act of rebellion against the king ;
on the 28th,1 therefore, the conventual estates were the second time
occupied by the king's officers. On that day Hubert left the kingdom ; Hubert tries
but on hearing of what had been done he wrote an urgent letter to the king's
the king, begging him, out of consideration for himself, to recall the against the
order. Such an act of violence would, he saw, effectually destroy mouks
any favour he might have found at Eome ; and although he did not
expect a favourable sentence, it would be better not, by following the
violent policy of his predecessor, to lay the foundation of future
difficulties, or arm the monks with their favourite plea of ' vis et
metus.' 2 The king complied with the petition, and the estates were
restored by a letter dated October 29th.3 Before this, Prior Geoffrey, The prior
notwithstanding his age and the melancholy precedent of Honorius, iiome
had determined to carry his appeal in person to Rome. Since the
31st of May no news had been received from the brethren there ;
the messengers despatched with the report of July 6th had not yet
certified their arrival ; the pope was known to be away from the city,
and the worst anticipations began to prevail as to the fate of the
absent monks.4 Not content, therefore, with sending a reinforcement
of three brethren, Geoffrey himself, about the middle of October,
started in company with Brother William, the precentor, and proceeded
slowly to Rome. At Lucca he met Brother Salomon, one of the third He aieets

brother

set of envoys, returning in triumph. Salomon at

The two brethren who had carried the first appeal were dead ;
the arrival of the abbots of Boxley and Robertsbridge was expected
early in September, and the pope, anticipating the action of the

1 Gervase, 1615, 1680. pope, after the visit of Hubert to

2 No. cccclxxxiii. Canterbury in January ; these must

3 No. cccclxxxiv. have been Jo. and Hubert, whom the

4 Unfortunately the names of the archbishop excommunicated after
monks chiefly concerned in the their departure (see above, p. 422) ; S.
second quarrel are only indicated by and 11. (No. ccccxcvi.) apparently
initials. The two who left the convent followed in July with the letter No.
secretly in January were S. and N. ccccl., and reached the pope in Sep-
Gervase says (c. 1601) that these ternber. The two monks who had
monks, having received the mandate died before Sept. 5, No. cccclxxx.,
of April 24, returned home. In this, were most likely the first party, S. and
however, he is clearly wrong, for they N. What had become of the others
write from Rome that they shall wait the prior did not know in September, .
to hear of the receipt of the mandate, but sent out three more, B., B., and
No. ccccxlviii. ; and they had not T., to reinforce them. Nos. cccclxxxvii.
arrived at home in June. See No. and ccccxcvii. He himself with
ccccl. Two others followed with the William the precentor followed early
archbishop's licence to consult the in the next month.

426

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

Arrival of

Hubert'*

cnvoyi

The hearing
by Inno-
cent ni.

The second
mandate of
Innocent III.

Geoffrey
proceeds to
Rome

convent, wrote urgently on the fifth of that month for new advocates to
be sent.1 This letter was not received at Canterbury until after the
prior's departure, but the arrival of the two or three reinforcements
sent out from home had rendered it unnecessary to regard it. The
brethren John and Hubert must have reached the court, which was
now at Perugia, before the llth of September, on which day the pope
wrote to the priors of S. Augustine's and S. Gregory's at Canterbury,
to declare invalid a sentence of excommunication which the arch-
bishop had fulminated against them.8 About the same time, before
the arrival of the archbishop's agents, Innocent wrote to the king
rebutting his arguments in Hubert's favour, and declaring his
intention of walking in the footsteps of his predecessors.3 A few
days after this, before the 17th, the abbots arrived at Perugia.4 But
the cause was not heard before the 21st of October, after the court
had returned to Rome. On that day * the pope heard the abbots on
behalf of Hubert, and listened to a long letter on the same side from
the archbishop of Lyons.6 On the 22nd he heard the answer of the
monks, and the following day the abbots were suffered to reply.
The monks on this occasion secured the all-powerful advocacy of
Ugolino, the pope's chaplain, the very eminent canonist who after-
wards filled S. Peter's chair as Gregory IX.7

Innocent took a month to draw up his judgment, which was
delivered on the 6th and despatched on the 20th of November. It
contained a clear and tolerably fair statement of both sides of the
question, but concluded with reiterating the former mandate. It
must be executed within thirty days, or Hubert would be deprived ;
this was notified to the suffragans, and the king himself was
threatened with spiritual punishments if he should interfere to
prevent the execution.8 Such was the news that Brother Salomon
had for the prior at Lucca.9 Great, however, as were the advantages
thus assured, Geoffrey was aware that all was not yet gained, and he
had his own appeal to prosecute. He therefore went on to Pisa,
whither he summoned three of the brethren who were at Rome. He
also retained Salomon, and sent the mandates home by William the
precentor. When he had ascertained the state of affairs, he pro-
ceeded to Rome, where he arrived on the llth of December,10 and
soon after had an interview with the pope. He laid his complaint

1 No. cccclxxx.

1 No. dlxix.

» No. dlxx.

4 The archbishop's agents had
reached the papal court before this, for
on the 17th Innocent issued to Hubert
the letter printed in the Foadera, i. 71 ;
and on the 18th and 19th others
commissioning him to reclaim the

alienated property of his see. Epp.
Innoc. III., ed. Baluz. lib. i. epp. 370
and 371.

Gervase, 1616.

See No. ccccxcviii.

Nos. div. dix. Ac.

Nos. ccccxcviii. ccccxcix. di. dii.

Nos. ccccxcvii.
1 No. dx.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 427

formally against the archbishop and the justiciars for the visitation
of September 26. Innocent, without waiting to hear how his second
mandate was received, wrote on the 22nd to the king, urgently
enjoining on him, 'in remissione peccatorum,' to recall the measures
he had taken against the convent ; he also wrote to the archbishop
of Rouen and the bishop of Ely to enforce canonical punishment
against all offenders, including implicitly the king himself.1

The archbishop received the second mandate on the 2nd of Huberts
January 1199,2 and prepared immediately to fulfil it. The offending the second
-chapel was levelled with the ground on the 27th ; the collegiate Sla'pro-'
buildings, however, were left standing. The bishops of Ely and theujeiegate
Lincoln and the abbot of S. Edmund's, to whom the execution of
the mandate was committed by the pope, summoned the rectors of
the alienated churches to appear at Westminster on the 10th of May
to give account to the convent.3 Whilst the latter were congratulat-
ing themselves on the obtaining of an iinprecedented success, the
letters which the pope had issued at the prior's request arrived.4
The monks, being wise enough to see that it would be ruinous to
them to provoke the king by making use of these, abstained from
presenting them.5 It is probable, however, that the royal agents at
Rome had informed their master of the issue, and on the 13th of
March0 the estates were again seized, on the pretext that the convent Tiie con-
had refused to allow the king's officers to inspect their treasure, the prrty seized
very point upon which the papal letter had been most urgent. This time- m
time the archbishop refused to intercede with the king. The
messengers who were sent to Richard himself were informed on their
way into Poictou 7 that he had fallen under that fatal bolt which
ended so many high hopes and opened the way for the bitterest
humiliation of the house of Anjou. Richard died on the 6th of Death of
April. The monk who was sent to him returned without redress ;
but Geoffrey Fitz Peter, hearing that his lord was dead, very shortly
after restored the estates of the convent. The monks would not,
however, regard this as an act of reparation, but pretended to look
upon it as a reinvestment or confirmation, such as was usually

1 Nos. dxix. dxx. Gervase, 1623. book of the epistles of Innocent III.

In this letter Innocent expresses the (May 29, 1198), explaining the mystical

great regard which he had for Richard meaning of four jewelled rings accom-

above all the princes of the world. panying it, belongs, according to M.

He had honoured him especially by Paris, to the year 1207, and to King

sending him a precious ring, the first John.

gift that was offered him after his - No. d. Gervase, 1623.

consecration, and which Richard be- ;' No. dv.

stowed on Abbot Samson of 8. 4 Nos. dxix. dxx.

Edmund's. Jocelin de Brakelonda, J Gervase, 1626. No. dxxi.

p. 72. The letter to the king of s Gervase, 1626.

England, which occurs in the first " Gervase, 1627.

-1-2H

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

Prvnh com-
plaint* sent
to Rome

Tbearcb-
bishop
clutngee bis

t-irtic-

Innocent
issues a
commission
to adjudge
the case

Instructions
of the com-
mission

Hubert's
further ag-

Proceeding*
of the dele-
gates

obtained on the succession of a new prince.1 They despatched
accordingly a third series of complaints to Rome, the burden of
which was the continued detention of the disputed churches in con-
tempt of the papal mandate, and the fact that the condemned
buildings of the college were still suffered to stand.3

The archbishop had now determined on a new plan. He probably
thought that the pope might be satisfied with the obedience exhibited
in the demolition! of the chapel, and that he would be willing to listen
to an application on behalf of the college, if it were made to himself
first. Immediately after the demolition of the chapel he sent his
agents to Rome to announce that so far the mandate had been fulfilled,
and that he was ready to grant the convent further redress for any
injuries that they could prove to have been inflicted on them in
consequence of their opposition to the new college. He prayed
further that a papal licence might be granted him to found a college
in honour of S. Stephen and S. Thomas at Lambeth, but on a new
site. This application the pope could not well refuse to entertain ;
he directed, therefore, a commission to the bishops of Lincoln and
Ely, and the abbot of S. Edmund's,3 to examine into the whole case.
They were instructed first of all to use their best endeavour to restore
concord between Hubert and his convent ; if that failed, they were
first to compel the archbishop to restore all that had been taken from
the convent to enrich the new foundation, or in consequence of their
opposition to it, and then to adjudicate on the question itself ; or if
they could not do that, to hear evidence and refer the decision back
to the pope. They were further empowered to visit Canterbury, and to
examine into the condition of the monastery, both external and internal.
Whilst his envoys were at Rome, Hubert had been provoked to
fresh acts of aggression. He had seized the marsh of Appledore, and
the oblations of the high altar. After his return to England in Easter
week,4 he had, towards the end of May,s closed the conventual courts
of justice. These acts were made the burden of fresh complaints :
the pope was further informed that the archbishop refused to let the
monks approach him, even in the solemn processions of the church,
but hedged himself in with clerks before and behind ; the very dress
of the clerks was a ground of accusation. Wearied with these petty
complaints, Innocent once more wrote, on the llth of September,6
to the archbishop, to induce him to more fatherly beha viour : he had
also ordered him, on the 21st of August, to restore all the churches
on the estates of the convent.

The delegates, on receiving their commission, summoned the
parties to appear before them at Westminster on the Friday after

No. dxxiii.
No. dxxv.

* No. dxxiv.

4 Oiraldus, Opp. iii. 81.

5 No. dxxiv. * No. dxxix.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 429

Michaelmas.1 The monks did not condescend to obey. Hubert
appeared, and laid before the judges his terms of reconciliation. The
convent were informed of this, and notice was given that the delegates
would hold their visitation at Canterbury on the 18th of November.2
It does not appear on what day it actually took place : the result was
signified to the pope by the convent ; 3 they had offered the archbishop Proposals of

... ., I-. ., ,i , » ,1 the convent

fair terms ; they would remit three years revenue oi their posses- f0r peace
sions, and the mesne profits of the disputed churches and the xenia,
in all fifteen thousand pounds sterling ; the churches were to
be confirmed to their incumbents for life, at a small annual
pension, and Hubert was to retain the xenia for his life. The
convent undertook the completion of the building of the cathedral ;
and further they offered, when the cathedral was finished to consent to
Hubert's building in some unsuspected place a college of canons
regular. The archbishop refused to listen to this proposition, and
insisted that the convent should throw themselves upon his mercy.

The formal hearing of the case was resumed, as it would seem, Argument

before the

on the 26th of January, 1200, at Westminster : 4 for that day the delegates
delegates peremptorily summoned the convent, who had failed to
attend on the 80th of September and the 27th of November ; if
they refused the third summons, judgment would go against them
by default. When they had presented themselves, the archbishop
made a formal claim to be allowed to build his college.5 The monks
insisted that, before the question could be entertained, their claim of
restitution according to the mandate should be satisfied. Everything
that had been taken from them, on account of the chapel at Lambeth,
must be restored. So the commission ran ; the delegates were
warned not to go beyond the letter of their authority. Hubert
sheltered himself under a verbal ambiguity ; and this having
been reserved by the judges, they proceeded to hear evidence. They
decided that the convent had failed to prove that they had lost
anything on account of the interdicted chapel : they notified the
decision to the pope, with the points reserved ; thus, virtually, -me powers
giving sentence in favour of Hubert. His clerks began to triumph ; g^/re-'6
the king forbade the papal judges to enter on the question of the voked
disputed advowsons ; 6 the quarrel broke out again with its old
bitterness. Innocent was prevailed upon by the convent to rescind
the powers of the delegates, and to recall the cause to Borne, the
parties to appear before the pope himself on the feast of S. Martin.
This letter was issued on the 21st of May.7

Before, however, the letter was received, a sudden change had suaaun
taken place in the feelings of the combatants. The delegates had theposmon

of the

1 No. dxxxi. 2 No. dxxxii. s No. dxxx. Gervase, 1680. parties

3 No. dxxxiv. &o. 4 No. dxxxiii. ° No. dxxxiv. ' No dxlv.

430

MEMORIALS OF THE REION OF RICHARD I.

Hubert
proposes to
choose Uie
rli-letrntes us
arbitrator!i

Final award
of the arbi-
trators

character of

appointed the Thursday before the feast of S. Simon and S. Jude l
for the last day of hearing. What produced the change in the
archbishop's tactics it is impossible to say ; according to the monks,
he was prevailed upon by the arguments of certain foreign scholars
who visited Canterbury ; 2 it is more likely that he had found by ex-
perience that he must not reckon on the continued support of the king ;
it is probable also that, most of the original promoters of the college
being now provided for, less pressure was brought to bear upon him
than had been before. Of one thing we may be sure, that he was
anxious that the cause should not be referred to Rome, but should be
settled in a way that was compatible with the laws of the kingdom.

On whatever motive he acted, he came down to Canterbury
before the day of hearing, and proposed that, instead of proceeding
on the apostolic letters, himself and the convent should agree to
elect the delegates to arbitrate in the case. The bishop of Lincoln
was dying ; Roger of Rolveston, the dean, might fill his place. The
convent having now, by Innocent's letter 3 revoking the commission,
the means of quashing further proceedings if they should be
unfavourable, accepted the archbishop's proposal. The bishop of
Ely, the dean of Lincoln, and the abbot of S. Edmund's sat at
Westminster, not as papal delegates, but as umpires chosen by the
parties to the suit.4 They pronounced their decision on the 6th of
November. It was highly favourable to the monks. The archbishop
might build at Lambeth, not, however, on the forbidden site, a church
of canons, but the church must be a small one, and the canons
Premonstratensians. It might be endowed from the archiepiscopal
estates or churches, but not from those of the convent or of the
almonry, or to an amount of more than a hundred pounds per annum.
No consecrations or ordinations were to be celebrated in it; no church
of secular canons must be built by the archbishop without the consent
of the convent. As for the alienated churches, they were to be held by
their present possessors, John, late archbishop of Lyons, Ralph of
S. Martin, Symon of Wells, and Master Virgil, at a small rent for life ;
when vacant they should be apportioned between the almonry and
the archbishop. Hubert was to have the xenia for his life. The
question of the marsh of Appledore should be settled by a jury of
twelve men.

The several parties signified this arrangement to the pope, who
ratified it on the 30th of June, 1201.

In the foregoing sketch of this famous struggle I have not thought
it necessary to be constantly recurring to the legal character of the

* No. dxlvi.

No. dxlvi.
No. dxlvii.

4 No. dxlviii. drc. R. de Diceto, 708.
Hoveden, 458. Ann. Winton. 305.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 431

proceedings. These were, in fact, a series of repetitions, and may
be dismissed in one sentence. The whole case turns on the persistence
of the convent in compelling obedience to the papal mandates, and
on the persistence of the king and archbishop in defeating them by
law, by force, or by fraud. The case was never tried on its merits. tri^m-Tits*
Whatever was the opinion entertained upon them both in Rome and ments
in England — and they are found frequently discussed in the unofficial,
sometimes in the official, correspondence — the proceedings turned at
Rome on the disobedience of the primates, in England on the contu-
macy of the convent. The same has been the case with the few writers
who have ventured to dip into the history. On one side the reasonable
rights of the archbishops have been obscured by the arbitrary means
they took to secure them ; on the other, all sympathy has been
alienated by the dishonesty and litigiousness of the monks.

There were, however, from beginning to end, points in dispute Point-3 foi-

. 11 canonical

that were quite open to tree discussion, both at canon and at common discussion
law. What right had the former archbishops to sacrifice the interests
of their successors ? What authority did the papal confirmation give
to acts ipso facto uncanonical, such as the alienation of the oblations
from the archbishop ? What were the powers of the convent to
restrain the acts of the primate as archbishop, or what, as abbot of
Christ Church ? These points were never considered pro tribunali
at Rome. Each party avoided appearing before the pope in the
presence of the other. The popes themselves issued their letters on
ex parte statements. The constant argument of the monastic party
was that the right of appeal must be maintained ; they would not
have a second pope at Canterbury. It might indeed have been
tolerable, had they been his cardinals, but as it was the liberties of
the whole Western Church were imperilled. To this representation
the successsive mandates were granted ; when they were contemned
they were followed up with others, and on the non-fulfilment of
these the decision of the whole case, had it been decided at Rome,
would have turned.

In England, on the other hand, the questions for legal decision Points for

i* 11 i • 11 i -i. .n decision at

were manifold, but the actual proceedings were as simple as at Rome, home
and probably, with some few exceptions, more directly opposed both
to law and equity. What was the real state of the law on the question
of appeals ? They were not unlawful, for the Constitution of Claren-
don that forbade them had been renounced by the king, and never
renewed. Yet every possible means was taken to defeat the prosecu-
tion of them. The mandates delivered from Rome were actually
illegal, but Henry did not venture to prohibit the publication of
them. Richard, on the other hand, did so prohibit them, and in
both cases with manifest advantage ; still the transgressors were not

482

MEMORIALS OF TUE REION OF RICHARD I.

Inconsist-
ency of the
conduct of
the arch-
bishop

Contrast
between the
tactics of
the courts
of Rome and
England

The fame
plan pur-
sued in both
the disputes

punished. Other questions might have been entertained at law
without any risk of coming in contact with the papal authority :
What was the validity of the charters of the convent which the king
denied ? What was their interpretation, if genuine ? What was the
nature of the tenure of their property, immediate of the crown, or
through the person of the archbishop? What right had they to
refuse to answer in the king's court except through the archbishop,
and yet to refuse his officers leave to hold the private courts in which,
as their abbot, he was the source of justice ? These questions were
avoided. The law was not strong enough to assert itself. If the
monks were guilty of illegal conduct, it was not by excommunication
or by confinement and blockade that they were legally punishable.
If they were never tried, they ought not to have been persecuted.
The archbishop was at Rome, admitting the legality of an appeal by
answering the appellants, whilst at home he was excommunicating
them, and throwing every obstacle in the way of a judgment that he
seemed to be soliciting.

The power of the Church of Rome was exerted and the spirit of
the court of Rome was aroused on the one side, on the other were
the national feeling and the majesty of the law of England. Irre-
spective of law, the pope and cardinals were engaged in sympathy
with one side, and the king, clergy, and lawyers on the other. Yet
they avoided coming to an actual collision, and in a manner tried to
gain a triumph rather by checking their adversaries in alternate
moves than by fairly facing the difficulties of the situation. In this
game the popes had a decided advantage, for they confined themselves
to ground which, on their own hypothesis, was strictly legal, and to
a series of measures, each of which sprang naturally and logically
from its predecessors. Their adversaries, on the other hand, afraid
to bring about a collision, moved in crooked paths and fought with
weapons that no law could justify. The policy of Rome was not
hampered with either the fear of law or the desire of peace ; the
popes played accordingly the more open game ; but they had nothing
to lose : whatever loss resulted would fall on insignificant monks ;
the law of England had the better cause, but it was enthralled by
the fear of spiritual weapons, or a second excitement such as had
been so fatal in the earlier years of Henry's reign.

The two struggles were conducted by the monks on the same
principles. In each case appeal was made against the acts of the
archbishop, and in each the appeal was withdrawn, or the archbishop
was persuaded that it was so. In each the withdrawn appeal was
secretly prosecuted, so that the convent might get the first word at
Rome, and yet be able to recognise or disavow, as occasion served,
the acts of their messengers. In each the result of the appeal was

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 433

an unfair judgment. A mandate was issued on ex parte representa-
tions. The archbishops were warranted in the belief that such acts
were null or illegal, or tried to anticipate the blow by excom-
municating the appellants ; the excommunication was made the
gravamen of a new appeal ; so mandate followed mandate, and appeal
followed appeal. At last extreme spiritual censures were threatened
and defied. In both the matter was settled by compromise ; in the Both de-
former the good sense of Richard and his advisers prevented a schism compromise
or an interdict ; in the latter Hubert was wise enough to yield ;
he saw, in fact, that the time for successful resistance was still
far off.

The characters of the two archbishops gave, however, a distinctive contrast
colour to each of the disputes. Baldwin, with his Cistercian notions, procedures6
his learning and unworldliness, was a very different man from Hubert aL?Baidwin
the legate, chancellor and justiciar, primate and commander-in-chief,
holding more than regal power in England, and possessing supreme
influence over the royal mind. Baldwin might be expected to
conduct the struggle as a priest, Hubert as a statesman or a soldier.
Possibly, as has been remarked above, the proceedings of Baldwin
may be regarded as characteristic of an unworldly man under the
influence of unprincipled advisers : but Hubert certainly acted for
himself. Hubert was careful to observe some regard to the law, and
was ready to yield where he saw he could not succeed. But Bald-
win, or those who acted with his authority, uniformly perverted the
process of the law, and preferred the weapons of terrorism. Yet in
the final arbitration it was by a side wind that Hubert saved the
dignity of the country, losing at the same time all that he had con-
tended for ; whilst, in the first, Baldwin gained all that he wanted
except one unimportant point. The difference of the result probably
arose from the different characters of Richard and John, and the
decreased interest that Hubert took in the design. He could not
reckon on John's support as he could upon Richard's. He was
content to sacrifice his own interest to save the law. The papal The law
commission and the long series of mandates were all set aside, and not vindi-
so far the law was upheld ; but the points in dispute were all given cated
against him ; and the very arbitrators who decided the award were
the persons whom the pope had commissioned as delegates. The law
was strong enough to rob the papal proceedings of their logical con-
clusion, but not strong enough to decide the cause on its merits or
by its own virtue.

And this is not to be wondered at ; for, not to speak of the con-
stant and accumulated aggravations of papal interference, the admin-
istration of the law of the land was in the hands of men too rough
and self-willed to handle so delicate an instrument. For the law

F F

434

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

1 11 u- 1 ra-
tions of
character*

Position of
Hubert

itself was not in its infancy, and was fully competent to decide on
nearly all the points involved ; but though the weapons were ready
and appropriate, they wore crushed by the hands that wielded them,
and the law was broken in the attempt to enforce it more than in
the attempt to evade it.

The character of Richard is illustrated in some minor points by
his course in these disputes. He stands in pleasant contrast with his
father in respect both of his openness and of his firmness. His
stout determination not to yield is manifest from the first. He
would not suffer the law of the land to be overridden by a rescript
from Home. He condescended to none of what S. Thomas called
his father's mousetraps : the tricks by which that astute king
managed to put his adversaries in the wrong without committing
himself to a decided course. He not only threatened, but actually
defeated, the legate, John of Anagni, in a way worthy of his father's
bolder days. He forbade the execution of the mandate of Innocent,
instead of trying to elude it either by chicanery or by bullying. And
the success of his resistance fully justified the more manly line he
took.

Not less conspicuous is the influence exercised over him by Arch-
bishop Hubert. Hubert's character has sufl'ered a good deal from
his connexion with Richard. From S. Hugh downwards, judg-
ment has been passed upon him as a man of secular mind, ambitious,
unscrupulous, the willing minister of a greedy tyranny. In some
respects his position was one of his own seeking. He was the first
archbishop of Canterbury who had retained secular power after his
accession to the primacy. With the exception of S. Thomas, he was
the only primate since the Conquest who had been chosen for any
other reason than learning or sanctity ; he was raised to the high
position which he filled simply for secular reasons. But it should
be taken into account that Hubert never worked for himself alone ;
he never enriched or aggrandised himself ; l if he grasped a power,
there were no other hands capable of grasping it, or even of holding
it for a moment. No one exercised over Richard an influence to be
compared with that of Hubert. In the recollection of this lies the
excuse for much of that arbitrary conduct that has offended his critics.
If the yoke when held by Hubert was heavy, what must it have been

1 Giraldus Cambrensis gives Hubert
a very bad character for dishonesty,
incontinence, ambition, avarice, and
tyranny. Besides this, be was both
utterly unlearned, and only saved by
his ignorance from being heretical.
See Giraldus's Invectiones, passim ;
especially Opp. iii. 28, 38, 39. These

calumnies would be utterly unworthy
of attention if the inventor had not
thought fit to retract them. As it is,
we must set against them the character
given by Gervase, 1681, 1682. Giral-
dus accuses Hubert further of aspiring
to the cardinalate, and even to the
papacy : Opp. iii. 23.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 435

in the hands of William Longchamp, a man who, not inferior in zeal
and faithfulness, and perhaps even superior in political acuteness,
had not the tact or the moral influence or a particle of the English
feeling that characterised the archbishop. That the influence of influence of
Hubert over Richard was not a mere accident, but the result of some- minister
thing in the character of the former, can scarcely be questioned ;
for he exercised the same among the haughty nobles and among the
citizens of London. The extent and character of this influence was
especially apparent in the pacification of England during Richard's cap-
tivity and in the management of the election of John.1 On the former
of these occasions it is almost amusing to remark the way in which
the minor actors, who had acquired some importance in the medley,
vanish before his strong and sensible proceedings. William of Long-
champ dwindles down into the king's chancellor ; Walter of Cou-
tances disappears almost entirely from the arena of English politics ;
Hugh of Puiset and Hugh of Nunant are compelled to keep order ;
John and Geoffrey are both put in their proper places ; Richard reigns
as powerfully from Spires or Worms as he did from Roche d'Andeli
or Azai. Hubert was himself a Norman nobleman, and allied with
the greatest names of the period of amalgamation. He had stood
face to face with Saladin both in the field of battle and in the council.
He who knew how to keep the lion-hearted king in something like
order was not likely to cower before a fellow-noble. He was not,
perhaps, the best conceivable minister for Richard, but he was pro-
bably the best, if not the only one, possible. He was a true patriot,
a man of honest purposes and of pure life. That such a man should
have the authority he had with Richard is enough to outweigh any
charges that can be brought against him as a minister, and the
details of the association bring out some of the better features of the
king's character at the same time.

If we regard him as a bishop, other considerations come in. Hubert as
The exchequer of a Norman sovereign could hardly be a good school a
of financial honesty, much less of theological training. Hubert was
sadly deficient in both the scholarship and the doctrinal learning that
become a bishop. The secular occupations to which he devoted him-
self could not be satisfactorily pursued without some dereliction of
his spiritual work. It can only be said for him that the greatness of unhappy
his country's need was his best excuse. Yet the results of the system
which he represented were very terrible. Under an archbishop whose
time was filled with secular work, and whose energies, however
commanding, could scarcely have grappled alone with the evils of the

1 The influence which he main- by Gervase as a proof of his wonderful
tained over John is especially noted prudence. Gerv. c. 1681.

F F 2

suite of
relig

486

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I.

Nigel'i view
of the clergy

Mischief of
appeal!

disordered church, the state of religion in the country was extremely
bad.

Nigel, the monk of Canterbury, and author of the Speculum
Stultorum, whose name is found two or three times in the following
pages (vol. R. S.), -has left us in his book De Abusu Ecclesiastico a
picture of the state of the church as viewed by a sincere and by no
means prejudiced monk. The following of secular pursuits by the
superior clergy had the double effect of laying open the spiritual
offices to unworthy persons, and of perverting religious endowments
to mere secular uses. Immorality and simony were crying sins in the
portion of the clergy that was supposed to be devoted to spiritual duties,
and these were rather encouraged than restrained by their poverty.
The superior clergy were generally free from these stains, but
ignorance, meanness, avarice, and servility were common among them.
Nigel doubtless attributed much of this to the inherent corruptness
of secular life ; but a careful study of these letters will show that there
was another cause at work, that did not lie, indeed, so deep in human
nature, but was almost as difficult to eradicate as if it had done so.
This was the paralysis of discipline in the church itself. There can
be no reasonable doubt that the hands of the bishops were tied by the
sufferance of appeals to Rome, contrary to the ancient custom of the
realm : the evil that had called for the Constitutions of Clarendon ;
the old evil, foreign to the English Church, which had been
gradually creeping in since the Conquest. It was practically in the
power of any contumacious priest to lodge an appeal to Rome,
which at once removed him from the authority of his diocesan, and
placed him, whatever his merits might be, under the protection of
the Holy See. Neither the spiritual nor the lay courts could try him ;
no bishop would subject himself to the annoyance and expense of a
suit which would almost to a certainty be decided against him. All-
powerful money could purchase, or wearisome pertinacity extort, a
mandate ; pains and penalties would follow the refusal of the bishop
to obey ; from that moment he ceased to be a judge and became a
defendant ; and that under a charge on which the Italian lawyers
never acquitted a bishop. The great proportion of English cases
which are found in the Decretals of Gregory IX., and the space that
English letters occupy in the letters of Alexander III. and his suc-
cessors, which are of course only picked cases and letters of supposed
importance, speaks more convincingly than any complaints of the
historians of the paralysis of judicial power in the English Church.
Although Hubert was neither a learned man nor a great theologian,
he did his best, by the means of councils and legatine visitations, to
remedy the evils that he saw existing. He failed under circumstances
in which S. Hugh of Lincoln and Baldwin of Canterbury failed too.

MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD I. 437

With the ideas that prevailed during this period on the subject of reversion
church preferment, there was doubtless a difficulty in attracting a endowments
superior class of minds to mere clerical work. The better endowments
were heaped upon men who were ready to serve the king in the business
of the State. The monasteries engrossed a vast proportion of tithe
and only scantily provided for the duties legally attached to the
possession. Piety was driven out of the church and choked in the
monastery. The foundation of colleges and enrichment of the cathe-
drals would have served to provide for the learned and legal clergy,
and have left parochial endowments to their natural purpose. But Sacrifice

demanded

this could only be done at the expense of the monastic order, either of the mo-

, ,. .. ,, . ,. .. ., , , . nastic orders

by alienating their revenues or by diverting that stream of pious
liberality that had flowed so long in their direction. It was partly
with this view that Henry II. and his ministers encouraged the
design of Baldwin ; and this, like every effort after reformation that
proceeded from the bishops, was foiled by the appeal to Rome.

The Hakington and Lambeth foundations may be regarded as importance
the last attempt to utilise the property of the monasteries before Hakington
the Reformation. It failed signally, and the need of the moment SeUi^ws
was satisfied within a few years by the introduction of the mendicant j^ry011
orders, who undertook the religious revival of the people ; these in
their turn provoked the parochial clergy to greater activity, and so
reform worked itself out ; later the lawyers set themselves to oust
the clergy from their secular occupations, and thus what was lost to
the state was gained for the well-being of the church. The
monastic system was left to itself until the sins of the fathers were
visited upon the children, and the endowments, which might have
nursed learning and amply provided for monastic peace and hos-
pitality, served to enrich the greedy courtiers of Henry VIII. and
Edward VI.

From the end of the twelfth century until the Reformation, Decline of
from the days of Hubert Walter to those of Wolsey, the monasteries power dates
remained magnificent hostelries ; their churches were splendid chapels time
for noble patrons ; their inhabitants were bachelor country gentle-
men, more polished and charitable, but little more learned or more
pure in life than their lay neighbours ; their estates were well man-
aged, and enjoyed great advantages and exemptions ; they were, in
fact, an element of peace in a nation that delighted in war. But, with
a few noble exceptions, there was nothing in the system that did
spiritual service ; books were multiplied, but learning declined ;
prayers were offered unceasingly, but the efficacious energy of real
devotion was not found in the homes that it had reared. The
monastic body had sacrificed the opportunity of doing good work
for the triumph of a moment. The great prize of their ambition,

488 MEMORIALS OF THE REIGN OF RICHARD L

the government of the church, fell from their hands. The position
occupied from henceforth by the monks of Canterbury — and their
state and weight may be taken as a fair criterion of the whole system
— was void of all political importance ; their action in the election
of the primate was merely nominal ; in spite of many efforts to elect
men of their own order, only once more did a monk fill the throne
of Augustine. With the exception of Simon Langham, whose
merits were by no means those of a monastic saint, Baldwin was the
last monk who governed the Church of England.

439

THE HISTOKICAL COLLECTIONS OF
WALTEK OF COVENTEY

[IN the following pages will be found a very remarkable sketch of the
character and life of King John. Bishop Stubbs shows how the reforms
of Henry II. had greatly strengthened the Crown, and emphasises the
fact that no adequate checks upon its still further growth had been
provided by the new system. Such power could be safely intrusted to
Henry II., who had himself recognised the existence of checks \ipon the
royal despotism. But when a tyrant like John arose, whose power was
restricted by no constitutional limits, the clergy, barons, and people
were forced into a union the outcome of which was Magna Carta. Bishop
Stubbs had nothing but scorn for the saying that John ' was the ablest of
the Plantagenets,' and his words on that subject which are here repro-
duced carry conviction with them.]

WHAT marks out John personally from the long list of our Johu tlu-

. . . . . worst of the

sovereigns, good and bad, is this — that there is nothing in mm which kings ot
for a single moment calls out our better sentiments ; in his prosperity
there is nothing that we can admire, and in his adversity nothing
that we can pity. Many, most perhaps, of our other kings have had
both sins and sorrows : sins for which they might allege temptations,
and sorrows which are not less meet for sympathy because they were
well deserved ; but for John no temptations are allowed to be pleaded
in extenuation of guilt, and there is not one moment, not one of the
many crises of his reign, in which we feel the slightest movement
towards sympathy. Edward III. may have been as unprincipled,
but he is a more graceful sinner ; William Eufus as savage, but he is
a more magnificent and stronger-willed villain ; Etbelred the Unready
;ts weak, false, and worthless, but he sins for, and suffers with, his
people. John has neither grace nor splendour, strength nor patriotism.
His history stamps him as a worse man than many wbo have done
much more harm, and that — for his reign was not a period of
unparalleled or unmitigated misery to his subjects — chiefly on account
of his own personal share in the producing of his own deep and
desperate humiliation.

440 THE HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS OF

opinions of None of the contemporary historians has left us a portrait of
Matthew " John that can be compared for minuteness and graphic reality with
those drawn of Henry II. by Peter of Blois, Ralph Niger, William of
Newburgh, and Giraldus Cambrensis. The last-mentioned writer, in
his book De Instructione Principum, published at the beginning
and revised at the end of his own long career, has recorded his early
impressions, and his by no means sanguine hopes, together with their
bitter disappointment. When he began to write John was young ;
his levity might, he thought, pass away and leave the elements of
greatness unimpaired.1 But when he registers his final sentence it
is that of all the tyrants of history John was the very worst.2 Ralph
of Coggeshall ventures on no inferences from his acts to his character.3
Matthew Paris, after averring that it is not safe to write of him even
when he is dead, puts his opinion of him into the mouth of another
critic, and a most trenchant one it is : he was a tyrant rather than a
king, a destroyer rather than a ruler ; an oppressor of his own and a
favourer of strangers ; a lion to his subjects, a lamb to his enemies
and to foreigners ; he had lost Normandy and his other lands by his
sloth, but England he thirsted to overthrow and destroy ; he was of
money an insatiable exactor, of his own natural possessions the
invader and destroyer ; he was a corrupter of daughters and sisters,
and spared not the honour of his pears and kinsmen. As to the
Christian faith, he was unstable and unfaithful.4 Matthew of

1 See the passage in which he is com- soendere nisibus elaboravit.' De Inst.

pared with his brother Geoffrey of Pr. iii. 28 ; p. 162.

Brittany, in the De Instructione, ii. 11 * This writer, although generally

(p. 35, ed. Brewer) ; and in the Topo- prone to run into descriptions of

graphia Hiberniae, iii. 52 ; Opp. v. character, draws none of John ; only

199. ' Ille in spica, hie messis in an occasional adverb, ' dolose,' ' crude-

herba.1 History seems fully to con- liter,' or ' ignaviter,' shows what he

firm Giraldus' s notion of the similarity thought.

of the two brothers in character, ' Ed. Wats, pp. 244, 288. It is

whilst it entirely belies the good augu- difficult to regard the embassy of John

ries which he imagines in the case of to the emperor of Morocco as al-

John. together fabulous, in the teeth of the

* ' Longe atrocius caeteris tyrannis evidence adduced by Matthew Paris,

omnibus, tarn in sacerdotium quam Thomas of Herdington, Ralph Fitz

regnum Anglicanum suis insaniredie- Nicolas, and Robert of London, whom

bus et debacchari.' — ' Dictus enim he names as the envoys, were real

Johannes . . . quoniam fratres egre- persons, and the first of them was

gios atque parentes in bonis eequiparare employed on an embassy to Rome in

non potuit, puta sicut annis inferior, the very year, 1213, in which this

sic animis amaris et actibus pravis transaction is placed. Rot. Clans, ed.

longe deterior existens, non solum ipsos Hardy, i. 12G. It is observable that

in malis verum etiam in vitiis enor- Innocent III. comments on the absence

mibus vitiosos vincere cunctos, et of three out of the six envoys sent in

imixime tyrannos omnes quos vel 1213, and of these three Thomas of

praesens ictus vel longeevae memoriae Herdington was one. Ep. xv. 234.

recolere potuit antiquitas, detestandis The words, however, which are put in

pravffl tyrannidis actibus totis tran- the mouth of the envoy are probably

Matthew Paris's own.

WALTER OF COVENTKY 441

Westminster long afterwards, when it was possible to record the opinion of
common belief, specifies his sacrifice of his kingdom by tribute, his
extortionate tyranny, his vile impurity, and his cruelty to Arthur, as
the chief points of his history.1

But although these writers either dared not or could not draw a His g'"eat

faults fre-

full-length picture of John, they are unsparing of comment on his quentiy re-

,, • t • TT- M. i- • marked on

acts as the occasion for comment arises. His vanity, his atrocious
ingratitude to his father and brother, his unprincipled and purposeless
avarice, his mercenary meanness,2 his utter lack of truth and honour ;
his inertness in the defence and recovery of his dominions ; 3 the
insincerity with which he treated his barons, and which more than
warranted them in their distrust of his most solemn assurances ; 4
his reckless neglect of his opportunities ; his desperate impotency of
rage under defeat that he had not troubled himself to avert ; his
cruelty, his obstinacy,5 his idiotic vindictiveness wreaking itself on
the innocent to his own harm ; his real incapacity for any great
design : all these are frequently remarked on by writers who saw Censures of
the daily proofs of them. The acts that call forth the censure are rials'8 '
not of the class which may allege the misrepresentations of interested
writers as a reason for mitigation. They are too manifest to be
doubted, and their character too obvious to be excused. Adultery,
falsehood, extortion, ill success, are matters on which the public
censors cannot have two opinions.6

1 Ed. Howard, p. 276. ' Et quia losam pro more suo stropham com-

iste Johannes se multis exosum prse- mentatus,' p. 253 ; cf. p. 250. See

buit, cum propter mortem nepotis sui also M. Paris, p. 255.

Arturi, turn propter suam incontin- 5 ' Proterva obstinacia,' Wykes, 56 ;

entiam qua fcedus lecti matrimonialis Ann. Wav. 282.

dirupit, turn propter suam tyranni- B No one can have failed to notice

dem, turn propter tributum quo sub that the most damning charges

perpetua servitute regnum Angliae against John are stated most fully by

compedivit, turn propter guerramquam Matthew Paris; that they do not

sua merita provocarunt, vix alicujus appear in Wendover or in the earlier

meruit lamentationibus deplorari. contemporary annalists. When it is

Istas sunt terras quas rex Johannes considered that they would touch the

amisit scilicet pro angariis et oppres- honour of many noble houses, we can-

sionibus, multimodis fornicationibus not wonder that they are passed over

et variis inj urn's quse communiter non by those who lived in the first genera-

cessavit. . .' tion. Enough, however, remains,

- As early as 1185, it was remarked without the circumstantial charges of

that in Ireland he defrauded his mer- Matthew Paris, to condemn the

cenaries of their pay : Hoveden, ii. 305. wretched king ; nor is there any

M. "\\ estm. speaks of his ' insatiabilis reason to suppose that that historian

avaritia,' p. 268. uttered more than the intelligent

3 ' Desidiam regis torpentis incor- opinion of his own time justified,

rigibilem.' M. Westm. 265 ; M. Paris, John's career must be read as a

209. whole, including the portion of it pre-

1 K. Coggeshall, who is not gene- ceding his accession, to be rightly

rally severe upon him, repeatedly comprehended. Of course the notion

accuses him of forging letters : ' fraudu- that Matthew wrote in the papal

442

THE HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS OP

Abundant
memorial*

Of the r. if! i

John was a
mean copy
of hU family
type

It is, however, fortunate for us that the history of the time
furnishes us with more than these generalities ; that we have not
only the comment but the text as well, in abundant records of all
John's proceedings, and that from the study of his actions we can
evolve a more real, lifelike, and individual presentment.

John, then, as far as I can read his character from his acts, was
a mean reproduction of all the vices and of the few pettinesses of
his family, of their intellectual as he was of their physical conforma-
tion.1 I say a mean reproduction, because although his crimes were
really greater, they are on a smaller scale, from smaller motives,
significant of that more unbridled vice that checks at no obstacle
and yields to the least temptation. Like his father he is a profligate,2
but his sins are complicated with outrage and ingratitude ; 3 like
Richard he is an extortioner, but unlike him he is meanly mercenary,
parsimonious, unsuccessful. Like Geoffrey he is faithless, but unlike
Geoffrey he is obstinate rather than impulsive. He never repents,
even if it be only to sin again ; he has no remorse, even for his
failures. He contemns both the spirit and the form of law ; of
religion he has none, scarcely sense enough of it to make him found
a monastery ; he neither fears God nor cares for the souls of his
people, but he is amenable to superstitions that his father would
have spurned. He is passionate, like the rest of the Conqueror's
descendants, but it is not the lion-like transport of Henry and
Richard ; he is savage, filthy, and blasphemous in his wrath ; 4 but he
sulks where he dare not reply, and takes his revenge on the innocent

interest is absurd ; he was strongly
antipapal, and the papal interest was
marshalled on John's side. He often
gives point to otherwise vague accusa-
tions, but in most particulars he is
borne out by other evidence. See
further on this point, pp. Ixxxii to
Ixxxiv (vol. R. 8.).

1 Oir. Camb. De Inst. Pr. li. 11;
p. 35. Exp. Hib. p. 199. ' Ambo hi
[sc. Geoffrey and John] statnrae
rqodicee, pauloque mediocri plus
pusi 1 lie.' The word ' lubriculus ' applied
by Wykes to one feature of his cha-
racter is very significant.

* Wykes, p. 53, ' quod nobilium
regni sui films et consanguineas rapuit
et concubitu polluit adulterine, erat
enim lubriculus, eequiparans vel ex-
cedens petulantiam Salomonis.' So
also Ann. Wav. p. 282, ' uxores filias-
que eorum violabat.' M. Westm. 265,
' effeminatus et fluens in libidinem.'
' Nonnullos uxoribus suis zelotypavit,
filiiis defloravit ; ' ' etiam exosum

habuit uxor propria quam de adulterio
adulter defamavit,' ib. 268. See also
Wendover, iii. 240; M. Paris, 282;
M. Westminster, 271.

1 In 1216 his brother William
Longespee joined Lewis, ' hac sola
special! causa ductus, quia ei certo in-
notuitrelatore, dictum Johannem regem
cum ipsius uxore, rupto fcedere natu-
rali, commisisse incestum, dum ipse
esset in Francia incarceratus.' Will.
Arm. Bouquet, xvii. 110.

' John's oaths, ' per denies Dei,' M.
Paris, 226; 'per pedes Domini,' M.
Paris, 243 ; compared with the Con-
queror's 'By the splendour of God,'
are characteristic enough. M. Paris
gives an instance of his capacity for
profane jesting, p. 246 ; he mentions
also John's false opinions on the re-
surrection of the dead. This may be
an invention, but it reminds one of the
debate between his kinsman Amalric
of Jerusalem and William of Tyre on
the same subject. W. Tyr. xix. 3.

WALTER OF COVENTRY

443

and in the dark. His ingratitude is not the common ingratitude of His con-
kings, to forget a benefactor when the benefit has grown cold ; he latitude"1"
heaps neglect on insult, and scatters scorn on the dead, whose chief
fault has been that they have served him too well.1 Unlike his father
and brother, he makes no friends among his ministers ; they are
faithful to him, but his only friends are his own creatures, whom he
has raised and whom he need not fear to sacrifice.

In the neutral tints of common character his pettiness is not less Pettiness of
apparent. The favourite son of Henry II. and the pupil of Glanvill general
could hardly be without a taste for law ; the instinct that in his
father produced great legal reforms, in John works only to the
multiplication of little methods of extortion,2 or the devising of new
forms of torture ; 3 like him he sits in the judgment seat,4 but only
for the wages of unrighteousness. Henry's promptness and energy
is in John undignified fussiness ; the lofty self-assertion of conscious
strength is represented in him by the mere vaunt that can plead no
justification ; 5 his recklessness in running into danger is only equalled His reck-
by the shamelessness with which he retreats before the evils that he shameiesa-
has provoked. Of himself he does nothing great, and what is done
for him by others he undoes by alienating or insulting them.0

1 See his remark on the death of
Geoffrey Fitz Peter, M. Paris, 243.
His treatment of William de Braiose,
who had greatly helped in securing
the succession, is remarked on in the
Annals of Margam, p. 25.

2 M. Westm. 265. He took of the
Jews, in 1210, 66,000 marks : Madox,
Ifist. Exch. p. 151. Abundant in-
stances of the expansion of the system
of fines will be found in the same work.

3 ' Multa mala et pessimas crude-
litates fecerat, quae non sunt scripta
in libro hoc.' Liber de Ant. Legg.
p. 202. For example, the ' capa plum-
bea,' in which Geoffrey the archdeacon
of Norwich was starved to death,
R. Wendover, iii. 229 ; the punish-
ment of the suspected servant of Queen
Isabella, Chron. Lanercost, p. 13 ; the
torture of the Jews, M. Paris, 229 ; the
22 noble prisoners starved to death at
Corfe, Ann. Margam, 26 ; the fate of
Matilda de Braiose and her son, Ann.
Theokesb. p. 59. He intended to
starve Oliver of Argentan to death
also, R. Coggesh. 251.

4 See Madox, Hist. Exch. p. 129,
' prseceptum est per regem qui praasens
t'uit super scaccarium.' Rot. Pip. 6
Job..

5 When in 1203 Philip was over-

running Normandy, John's remark
was, ' Sinite ilium facere : ego quicquid
modo rapit uno die recuperabo.'
Wendover, iii. 171. When Philip took
Rouen, ' rex Johannes cachinnando
comminabatur, jurans per pedes Dei
quod sterling) Anglorum omnia restau-
rarent.' M. Westm. 266.

0 John's greatest exploit was the
subjugation of Ireland in 1210, the
conquest, with a magnificent army, of
a half-armed and divided population,
exhausted already by war and plunder.
Our author, who (ii. 202, 203) makes
the most of his successes at this period,
mentions also victories in Wales and
Scotland : no great glory could be \von
from either : he had in 1211 to retreat
from the former, and sold a peace to
the latter in 1209. He was not, how-
ever, devoid of personal valour or of
skill in arms ; but his rashness and
irresolution constantly brought him
into situations in which he must either
right or fly, and he chose the latter.
R. Coggeshall describes him on Lewis's
landing in 1210, ' perterritus fugit
flens et lamentans, et omnis exercitus
ejus cum eo,' p. 258. Yet he had been
waiting to intercept Lewis, and had a
superior force.

444

THE HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS OF

HI* fault*
IncreMed by
hi* educa-
tion

He bad a
Iwd political
education

He was more
or less of an
adventurer

He was born
too late to be
impressed
by tbe
Becket
quarrel

Although the faults which come out in this form in him are
faults so ingrained in the Angevin family that they can scarcely be
regarded, except in the particular manifestation, as distinctive of John,
somewhat of the result is no doubt to be attributed to his age and
training. The youngest of the sons of Henry and Eleanor, he was
born1 long after the arrangement was made by them for the distri-
bution of their states, and consequently lost that education for
government which his elder brothers had, and which made a Norman
of Henry, a Poictevin of Richard, and a Breton or Angevin of Geoffrey.
The title of lord of Ireland did not make John an Irishman;
although a stay-at-home, he did not learn the feelings of an English-
man ; he remained, until he became king, without local connexion, a
plotter and conspirator against his father and brother, unidentified
with any national or provincial interest, representing no party but
his own.

And the result of this was that it stamped him more or less with
the character of an adventurer. In his earliest childhood his father was
busy in seeking to make him a fortune by marriage ; the rebellion of
his brother Henry was provoked by an attempt to carve out a portion
for John ; for John's sake the attack on Ireland was carried out and
the crown of peacock's feathers obtained from Rome ; 2 the final
rebellion of Richard was caused by the demand that Poictou should
be given up to John ; and during the whole of Richard's reign John
was trafficking on the jealous hostility of Philip.

Further, he was born too late to be much affected by the Becket
quarrel. The archbishop was murdered when John was not four
years old, and the matter was condoned before he was six. He thus
missed the impression which, partly perhaps unconsciously, but in a
measure no doubt through the instructions of Lewis and Eleanor,
produced in Richard and in the younger Henry something approaching
to a religious feeling, or at least the desire to stand well with the
dominant ecclesiastical sentiment of the day. He reproduces in the
utmost coarseness the blasphemous profanity of his father's ancestors ;
his whole education, such as it was, was carried on during the most

that he was born on the 24th of De-
cember, and that two meteors were
seen the same evening, is taken from
the margin of Robert of Gloucester's
Chronicle (ed. Hearne, p. 486) ; both
the facts appear to be taken from Ro-
bert de Monte, with the alteration of
a year, and placed in the 13th of
Henry II., i.e. 1166 instead of 1167.
Trivet, p. 60, follows Robert de Monte
and gives the right date, Dec. 24, 1167.
• Hoveden, ii. 306, 307.

' The date of John's birth is fixed
by Robert de Monte (ed. Pistorius, i.
903) in 1167 ; by Ralph de Diceto (c.
540) in 1166. The compiler from
whom the late Bishop Stubbs
borrowed placed it in 1166, vol. i. p.
186. Robert de Monte is the best
authority, especially as he has just
mentioned Queen Eleanor's return to
England. Diceto, however, who may be
regarded as correecting Robert de
Monte, is followed by the Annalists
generally. The common statement

WALTER OF COVENTRY 445

unsettled part of his father's reign ; from the time he was eight years |[e i«a no

,7 . '-,'ood home

old to his twenty-third year his mother was practically a prisoner, influences
and if he were allowed to associate with her we may be sure that her
lessons were not of the wisest sort. If, as is more probable, she was
kept in seclusion, she lost that influence over him during the time
when it would have been most beneficial, which it is but justice to
her to say was always exercised, where it is at all traceable, in the
direction of honesty and manly energy.

His early history is distinctly affected by these facts, especially Appropri-
the former. The name of Sansterre or Lackland,1 whenever and wfranuune
however it was given him, affords one clue at least to the reading of fMCkland
his character and career. Even his infancy is rendered eventful by
his father's anxiety to provide for him.

He was born in England in 1167,2 and seems to have remained ins father's
under his mother's charge until her imprisonment. Afterwards he 'provide for
is generally found in attendance on his father. In 1170, when Henry b
believed himself at the point of death,3 he commended him to his
eldest brother, with strict injunctions to make for him such a provision
as he would himself have done ; and immediately on his recovery he
set to work to obtain a settlement for him, entertaining the idea,
possibly as early as this, of fixing him in Ireland and securing him the
county of Mortain.4 In 1173 he arranged a marriage for him with TheMau-
the heiress of the county of Maurienne and Savoy, by which John riage pro""
was to succeed to the possessions and claims of the marquis of Italy, i(
and consolidate the power of the Angevin house from the Atlantic
to the Alps.5 It was the very natural question of the count, what
provision would be made for the little bridegroom to answer to so
great a portion,6 that provoked the revolt of the other sons of Henry,
none of whom would consent to part with a single fief for the endow-
ment of their father's darling. John was too young to take part in
the war that followed, but he was old enough to understand that it
was for his sake that his father had incurred it, a fact which seems to
have inspired him rather with a feeling of his own importance than

1 William of Armorica (lib. vi. p. 2 See above, p. 444, note 1. Like

303, eel. Pith.) says that the name was Richard he is said to have been born at

given by Henry II. He seems to have Oxford : Rob. Gloucester (ed. Hearne),

shared it before the middle of the p. 486.

thirteenth century with John of 3 Bened. i. 7.

Brienne, king of Jerusalem, to whom 4 On the date at which the county

it is given in the Chronique de Rains of Mortain was given to John, see

(ed. Paris), p. 84. Matthew of West- Hoveden, ii. p. 6, note, and iii. p. xxiv.

minster (p. 276) explains it with a note.

further reference to his losses in s Bened. i. 36, 37, &c. Gir. Camb.

France and his deposition in England, De Inst. Princ. lib. ii. c. 1. Rob. de

p. 270. Cf. Liber de AntiquisLegibus, Monte, ad arm. 1171.

pp. 200, 202. c Bened. i. 41.

446

THE HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS OF

Provision
from the
earldom of
Cornwall

Marriage
with the
ln>ir,~- of
Gloucester

John lonl of
Ireland ;
where he
fails com-
pletely

Becomes a
rival to
Richard in
his father's
hands

Wretched
result of his
training

with any idea of gratitude. On the peace of 1174,1 his interests were
seoured, although not liberally enough to satisfy Henry's wishes ;
and in 1175 the revenues of the earldom of Cornwall, which was
vacant by the death of Earl Reginald, were detained in his favour.1
The next year, the Maurienne settlement being endangered by the
fourth marriage of the count, and a better opportunity being opened
at home by the prospect of the inheritance of Gloucester,3 John was
betrothed to the eldest daughter of Earl William, the Lady Hawis,4
whom he discarded soon after his accession to the throne, and who
afterwards, as wife of Geoffrey de Mandeville, helped to swell the tide
of national feeling against him in 1215. 5 In 1177 he was made lord
of Ireland, and received the homage of the native chiefs as their
future king,6 not, however, being intrusted with real authority until
many years later. In 1185 he was knighted and sent to Ireland,7
where he signally failed. He lost his forces in petty struggles with
the Irish, and devoted himself to the plundering of all who came
within his reach.8 He was therefore recalled in disgrace, but only to
be used as before for his father's political ends. Two of his elder
brothers, Henry and Geoffrey, were now dead ; the king mistrusted
Richard and pitted John against him,9 partly no doubt in the hope
of keeping him faithful from a sense of interest, but partly with the
view of providing more lavishly for his favourite child. The result
of this policy was most unfortunate in every way ; John threw him-
self on the side of his father's enemies, and, rendering himself
eternally infamous for his ingratitude, broke his father's heart and
hastened his death.10

Up to this date, then, Henry had made of him, as he had
in a less degree of his brothers, a plaything of policy : one of
his stakes in the great game he played, but the favourite plaything,
the most precious stake. He could scarcely have had a worse
political education. It made him a gambler, through his partner-

1 Benecl. i. 78.

2 Robert de Monte (ed. Pistorius,
i. 917), ap. Pertz, viii. 524.

1 Earl William of Gloucester died
in 1183. R. de Monte, ap. Pertz,
viii. 534. His son Robert in 1170, ib.
519.

• Bened. i. 124.

1 Walt. Cov. ii. 225.

• Bened. i. 161, 165 ; Walt. Cov. i.
308.

7 Bened. i. 339; Hoveden, ii. 303,
305.

• Oir. Camb. Exp. Hib. ii. 36 (Opp.
v. 388).

• As early as 1183 Henry proposed

that John should have his mother's
inheritance, Richard being now his
father's heir. Richard refused : Bened.
i. 308. The next year he is allowed to
invade Richard's states: Bened. i. 311.
The jealousy of the brothers goes on
increasing, and in 1189 Richard, be-
lieving that his father intended to dis-
inherit him, refused to go to Palestine
unless John were sent with him :
Bened. ii. 66. The same year the king
proposed to marry him to Alesia, who
had been long betrothed to Richard :
Hoveden, ii. 363.

10 Gir. Camb. De Inst. Princ. iii. 26
Hoveden, ii. 366.

WALTEE OF COVENTEY 447

ship and interest in bis father's game. Devoid of sound principle

and incapable of reading the secrets of Henry's design, he learned

to grasp at the advantage of the moment, to trust as no other prince

of his age did to the chapter of accidents ; having as yet nothing Joim a

very great to risk, to hazard what he had on the throw of the instant, Ambler

or, without troubling himself about present losses, to leave all to

the chances of the future. Richard and Eleanor saw probably that

this was the case, and that, devoid as he was of either force of

character or strength of principle, the only chance of keeping him

safe and innocuous was to intrust him with a substantial gift of

power. He might be steadied by permanent and engrossing

interests of his own. His marriage was accordingly pressed on,

and that done, Eichard, in the lavish improvidence of his heart, Hicham

touched, perhaps, by remorse for his conduct to his father, and steady Mm

showing it in his bounty to the favourite, heaped on him an of power

enormous appanage,1 merely guarding himself by the retention of

some of the castles of his honours.

Notwithstanding the plausibility of the view that prompted this
measure, Eichard showed his usual shortsightedness by such
exaggerated confidence, or else he was over-persuaded by Eleanor's
influence in John's favour. Eichard had a most contemptuous Bad policy
opinion of his brother's abilities,2 and perhaps was not quite aware liberal
of the extent to which he was himself influenced by the spirit of fe
hazard. John, it might seem, would be faithful if intrusted with
the substance of power ; if not, he was too weak to be dangerous.
But there were other elements of danger besides John, and Eichard
really risked the welfare of his kingdom on the issue. So long as
he was by Eleanor's side, he might be kept in order ; but the return
of Philip from the crusade, and his obstinate underhand policy,
which Eichard might have learned, so long and persistently had it
been tried upon himself, he, clearly, had not calculated on.-"

But in the true gambling spirit, John, instead of contenting John's rash
himself with his improved position, used it simply to play a still L
more dangerous game. The oath which Eichard had demanded
from him on his departure for the crusade, binding him to absent
himself for three years from England, was remitted at his mother's
request,1 and no sooner had the king fairly started than John
returned. And here he immmediately found himself in a situation
full of temptation and full of opportunity. Eich beyond his earlier
dreams, holding the actual administration of a broad belt of

1 BenecL ii. 73, 78, 99. pellat.' Hoveden, iii. 198.

2 ' Johannes frater meus mm est 3 Hoveden, iii. pref. pp. Iii, sqq.
homo qui sibi vi terrain subjiciat, si Ixxxvii, sqq.

fuerit qui vim ejus vi saltern tenui re- 4 Eic. Devizes, p. 15.

THE HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS OF

Hi« position

oomcwlmt

tantalising

His first
object is to
supplant
Arthur as
heir

Next to
supplant
Richard
himself

He obtains

recognition

as heir, and

intrigues

against

Richard

His con-
spiracy with
Philip of
Prance

territory covering the fairest counties of middle and southern
England ; already, as the eldest adult prince of the royal house,
attracting to his court all the elements of opposition to the royal
officials ; entitled, by his titular sovereignty of Ireland, to all the
retinue and pomp, if not to the name of royalty ; he yet saw him-
self with no recognised position of authority ; the most powerful
baron, but not the regent ; the nearest in blood, but not the heir ;
close to the throne in both ways, but with no definite claim on the
succession or inherent hold on power. Between him and the throne
stood young Arthur, the recognised heir, growing more dangerous
every year ; and between him and the regency, not only his mother,
whom even her love for him could not bend beyond a certain point
of compliance, but the rough, unpopular, yet very able justiciar, the
king's constitutional lieutenant, a man unscrupulous, insolent,
unjust, but indisputably faithful.1

To secure the succession to the exclusion of Arthur was John's
first aim ; had not King Henry purposed to exclude Richard to
make him king ? 2 Next, to supplant Richard himself by Philip's
aid, and trust to the chances of his death or captivity for an escape
from his vengeance. A hazardous game, but not the less tempting.
The first step was to unseat the justiciar. After two desultory
struggles John succeeded in effecting this, and in obtaining from
the baronage a more or less occult engagement to accept him
as heir to the crown.3 So great a success was too much for him ;
he could not wait ; if he had let England alone, Richard might
and probably would never have returned from Palestine. He took
the readiest way to bring him home. In vain the warning voice of
Eleanor pleaded, commanded, and reproached ; 4 as soon as the king
of France returned John entered into his designs at once. The
threat of forfeiture brought him to his mother's side, but he was
not proof against a bribe. The exiled chancellor purchased his
promise to consent to his return ; the barons offered a higher sum ; s
John withdrew the promise and left his old competitor in the lurch.
Then came the news of Richard's capture, and again John was in
France conspiring with Philip. Now raising money for the ransom
and putting it in his own pocket ; 6 now offering the emperor a

1 Hoveden, iii. pref. xl-xliii.

* Hoveden, ii. 363. The words of
the historian may be interpreted
merely of Henry's intention to exclude
Richard from the succession to the
continental estates, as in Gir. Camb.
De Inst. Princ. p. 91 ; but it is observ-
able that he never allowed homage to
be done to Richard as his successor
either in England or in Normandy.

* Hoveden, iii. pref. lix, Ixxix.

1 Itiher. B. Ricardi, p. 359; Bic.
Devizes, p. 57 ; Bened. ii. 237.

4 B. Devizes, p. 59 ; Bened. ii. 239 ;
Hoveden, iii. 188; Oir. Camb. V.
Oaufr. Ang. Sac. ii. 402.

• The measures taken in 1193 for
ascertaining the amount of his receipts
on this head put the fact beyond a
doubt. Hoveden, iii. 217.

WALTER OF COVENTRY 449

bribe to prolong the captivity ; ' now brought by his mother to
reason, now tempted by Philip to hazard a larger stake ; unable to
defend his own servants, and unwilling to make the least sacrifice,
he fails signally on both sides. The barons, who had clung to him Failure of
as the leader of the constitutional opposition, will have nothing to against™*
say to him as a traitor ; even those who were afterwards the most B
faithful to him took the leading part in his discomfiture : the same
week 2 saw him excommunicated and condemned to forfeiture by the
man who was afterwards to be his prime minister, and the return of
Richard, which he had been unable to prevent, found him an abject
suppliant. Humiliated as he was, he was too mean for Richard's
vengeance.3 He pardoned and enriched him, but he trusted him
no more.

Up to the time of Richard's death it may be safely affirmed that uncertainty
John had shown none of the qualities that would have fitted him to prospecYof
reign ; not even the energy which comes out on one or two occasions toThTcrown
in his later career. If it had in any considerable degree depended
on himself, he would never have reigned. The uncertainty of the
rule of succession, which is so often adduced in illustration of our
early history, is scarcely anywhere brought out more clearly than on
this occasion. It is probable that Richard had never seriously
considered the subject before he received his death- wound. Arthur
had been, early in the reign, put forward as the heir, in the idea
possibly of repressing the ambition of John, for Richard was not of
an age to despair of having children of his own ; and later on there
were indications that Otho of Saxony, to whom he had given the
county of Poictou, and for whom he had tried to secure the succession
to the throne of Scotland, might be substituted for the nearer
claimant.4 But in the year before Richard's death Otho had been
chosen king of Germany, and Arthur only remained in John's way.
Richard on his deathbed set Arthur finally aside,5 and that we may He i? recog
suppose for good reasons, although John did his best to discredit "drat*
them. Eleanor's influence was used for John, and the most faithful J^^

1 Hoveden, iii. 229, 232. Richard's reign, been promised the

- Hoveden, iii. 236, 237. counties of York and Poictou, and

3 Itin. R. Ricardi, p. 449. ' Excel- that, although he was elected king of
lentia siquidem animi dedignabatur Germany by his uncle's influence, that
inferiorem punire ; reputans sibi sufii- influence Richard had intended to be
cere se posse vendicare.' used in favour of his elder brother

4 Richard left Otho his jewels : Henry, thus leaving Otho free for any
Hoveden, iv. 83. Otho's presumptive further provision that might be made
claim is recognised by the pope in for him. Hoveden, iv. 38. Henry,
1216, although his elder brother Henry however, was in Palestine when the
the Count Palatine was alive : R. Wen- election took place.

dover, iii. 375. It is observable also •' Hoveden, iv. 83.

that Otho had already, early in

G G

450

THE HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS OF

<>p position
to his 8uc-
ceMlou, in

A ni on aii' I
Maine ;

pnt down
by himself
and his
mother

Opposition

;i nun i L- the

English

barons

Rigorous ad-
ministration
of Richard's

lust years

Attempt of
the barons
to make
terms with
John

Ills political
ind personal
foe*

of Richard's ministers made it their business bo carry out hia final
disposition.

But for this John would have had little chance of being king.
Both in England and on the continent there were strong parties
against him. In France the barons of Maine and Anjou were anxious
to have Arthur for their count ; they had been in the interest of his
father, and had a close connexion with Brittany, which his mother
Constantia had striven to maintain. At her instigation they rose
on the news of Richard's death, declared for Arthur, and placed him
in the hands of Philip as his legal guardian.1 Eleanor thereupon
took the command of Richard's mercenaries and reduced Anjou to
obedience,2 whilst John enforced the submission of Maine. In
England there was a strong party which was unwilling to accept
John at all, or prepared to accept him only under very definite
conditions ; and there the securing of the crown depended on the
services of Richard's ministers.

It would be very interesting if we could ascertain the exact
standing-ground and programme of the opposition, but only the
names of the leaders are known, and they seem to have been only
partially actuated by dislike to John. In truth the administration
of the last few years of Richard's reign had been somewhat rigorous,3
and his absence from England a matter of policy. Hubert Walter
had carried out Henry's system of abridging the power of the great
nobles : not a few of the heirs to earldoms had been for some years
uninvested,4 and therefore deprived of a portion of their revenues ;
and the adjustment of their rights, which was to become an
important rallying point in the later part of the reign, was loudly
called for.5 It is not unlikely that, whilst accepting John as an
ultimate necessity, they would still try to make good conditions.
Besides these there were a few who had always hated him : Richard
de Clare, earl of Hertford, the husband of one of the disinherited
daughters of Gloucester, and the ally of the justiciar in the struggle
of 1191; 6 the earl of Chester, who had married Constantia of
Brittany, and whose policy halted between the temptation of being
stepfather to a king and the hatred of his unfaithful wife ; 7 David
of Huntingdon, whose line would be dictated by his brother the king
of Scots, and who would attempt by prolonged neutrality to keep
open the question of restoring Northumberland and Cumberland to
him. The heads of the houses of Mowbray, Ferrers, and Beaumont

1 Hoveden, iv. 86, 87.

* Hoveden, iv. 88.

* Hoveden, above, p. 302.

* It is observable that even Wil-
liam Marshall and Geoffrey Fit/,
Pet«r were not formally invested until

the coronation of John. Hoveden
iv. 90.

1 Hoveden, iv. 88.

9 Hoveden, iii. 137.

7 Hoveden, ii. 325 ; iv. 7, 97.

WALTER OF COVENTRY 451

were also suspected, on the general ground, it would seem, of their
hereditary opposition and strong feudal antecedents. But the prompt
action of the ministers of Richard decided the point. Hubert They are
Walter, Geoffrey Fitz Peter, and William Marshall summoned the overly
barons to Northampton before they had had time to communicate waiter
with one another, and there by promises and arguments obtained
their adhesion.1 Not a voice was raised in England for Arthur, and John

elected

Hubert on the day of coronation was enabled to appeal safely to
the assembled baronage on behalf of John as the elective king.2

The strength of John at the beginning of his reign consisted important
chiefly in the support of four persons : his mother Eleanor, who Eleanor,
maintained by prestige and intrigue his hold on the continent ; waiter,
Hubert Walter, Geoffrey Fitz Peter, and William MarshaU, who,
as the chief officers in church and state, continued the regime of
Henry II. in England. Their support was strong enough not merely
to obtain his succession, but to keep up his position for many years,
notwithstanding his neglect of their advice and the many acts of
tyranny and folly which they strove in vain to counteract. And it
is important to note that just as the position of the Angevin dynasty
in France collapses on the death of Eleanor, so in England the death John's
of Hubert Walter marks the break-up of friendly relations between lapses on
the king and the church, and the death of Geoffrey Fitz Peter the us mother*
final rupture with the baronage ; after which the very existence of ^n^rs
the royal line depends for years on the adhesion of William Marshall
and on the political influence of a new agency, the direct interference
of the popes. Under these heads it may be convenient to range the
points of remark which present themselves in this general view of
the reign.

Few women have had less justice done them in history than Career of
Eleanor. I do not speak of her moral qualities : although probably
her faults have been exaggerated, she can hardly be said to shine as
a virtuous woman or a good wife ; but of her remarkable political
power and her great influence, not only in her husband's states, but
in Europe generally ; of her great energy, not less conspicuous than Her energy
her husband's, both in early youth and extreme old age, there can be activity0

1 Hoveden, iv. 88. Ralph of Cogges- elective character of the English
hall, however, seems to say that the crown, because it is not mentioned
country was already in the greatest by Roger of Wendover, but is inserted
confusion ; and that the barons or by Matthew Paris, and, considering
some of them broke into open ravages his strong views on constitutional
on Easter day, having received the points, might be regarded as a corn-
news of Richard's death the day before position of his own. But it is referred
(ed. Dunkin, 170). to distinctly by Lewis of France in his

2 Doubt is thrown on Hubert's delaration against John in 1216. Feed,
famous speech on this occasion, in i. 140. See also Dr. Pauli's note,
which he distinctly declares the Gesch. v. Engl. iii. 297.

GO 2

452

THE HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS OF

Her long
journeys in
her old age

no question. In an age of short-lived heroes one scarcely realises
the length of her adventurous life or the great area of her wanderings.
Fifty years before this she had gone on crusade, and by her undis-
guised flirtations had spread confusion and dismay and discord in
the noblest host that ever went to the East.1 Her divorce had over-
thrown the balance of power in two kingdoms, producing in one of
them a disruption which it required four hundred years of warfare
to remedy. Her quarrel with her second husband long retarded the
reforming schemes of his great administrative genius, and consigned
her to fourteen years of captivity. Yet those fourteen years appear
but a short episode in her long life. Henry's death brought her
from prison to supreme power.2 As Richard's representative in
England, she repressed the ambition of John and thwarted the
designs of Philip ; she found time and strength, at seventy, to
journey to Messina with a wife for her son,3 to Rome on an embassy,4
and to Germany with the ransom that her energy had helped to
accumulate/5 After a few years of rest she is again on foot at
Richard's death. To her inspiration John owed his throne ; her

1 Bichard of Devizes, who writes
with a barbed pen, says of her,
' Begina AJienor, femina incompa-
rabilis, pulchra et pudica, potens et
modesta, humilis et diserta, quod in
femina solet inveniri rarissime ; quae
non minus annosa quam quae duos
reges rnaritos habuerat et duos reges
filios, adhuc ad omnes indefessa
labores, posse cujus aetas sua mirari
potuit . . . Multi noverunt quod
utinam nemo nostrum nosset. Haec
ipsa regina tempore prioris mariti fuit
Hierosolymis. Nemo plus inde loqua-
tur ; et ego bene novi. Silete ' (p. 25).
The facts of the case seem to be
these : Eleanor and her first husband
went together on the second crusade,
he as a monk, she in the usual spirit
of a gay and courtly pilgrim. Her
extravagance was encouraged by her
uncle, the prince of Antioch, who
hoped through her influence to sway
the councils of Lewis ; and in this he
failed. Lewis was made doubly miser-
able by the levity and by the political
meddling of his wife. William of
Tyre puts the case well (lib. xvii. c. 8) :
' injuriarum memor, quas in via et in
toto peregrinationis tractu uxor ei
inogaverat.' The king divorced her
on his return home. The divorce
took place in 1154, so that he mast
have nursed his grievances for nearly
seven vears. From William of New-

burgh, however, it would seem more
probable that Eleanor herself desired
the divorce, owing to incompatibility
of temper, or to a passion she had
formed for Henry. From the fact of
the divorce orginated the stories of
her criminal misbehaviour ; for these
William of Tyre is answerable, though
not intentionally, his statement being
clearly based on his inference from
the divorce : ' erat, ut prsemisimus,
sicut et prius et postmodum manifest is
edocuit indiciis, mulier imprudens, et
contra dignitatem regiam legem
negligens maritalem, thori conjugalis
fidem oblita ' (lib. xvi. c. 27). On this
basis the Romancers very early con-
cocted an amour of Eleanor with a
Saracen knight, and later identified
the knight with Saladin himself : ' la
ducoise Elienor qui fu male feme . . .
quant la roine Elienor vi la defaute
(moleche et nichete) que li rois avoit
en lui, et elle oi parler de la bonte et
clou sens et de la proueche Salhedin,'
she offered to elope with him. Chron.
de Rains, pp. 4, 5. The divorce was
the origin, not the result of the accusa-
tions. The innuendos of Oiraldus,
De Instr. Pr. iii. 152, are of the same
value.

1 Benedict, ii. 74 ; Hoveden, iii. 4.

1 Bened. ii. 157; Hoveden, iii. 95.

4 Hoveden, iii. 100.

1 Hoveden, iii. 220, 233.

WALTER OF COVENTRY 453

influence excluded, no doubt, the unhappy, misguided Arthur ; she
herself took the command of the forces that reduced his friends in
Anjou to submission ; : she travelled to Spain to fetch the grand-
daughter whose marriage was to be a pledge of peace between France
and England.2 She outlived, it would seem, the grandchild who
had outraged her. She lived long enough to see Philip's first attacks
on Normandy ; 3 from her deathbed she was writing to the barons
to keep them in their allegiance,4 and her death at the age of eighty-
two was followed by the subversion of all the continental projects of
her husband. But her own dominions in great part remained to her H.er domi-

1 nioiis pre-

son's son, as if her mighty shade were able to defend them at least s-crved to
from the hated offspring of Lewis VII. scendauts

Eleanor no doubt loved John as her youngest son ; she seems to Her exer-
have disliked Arthur and his mother, moreover, for their own sakes. reconciiia-
Further, little as she had loved Henry II., she was naturally averse and Philip
to the dismemberment of his empire. Hence, notwithstanding her
great age at the time of Kichard's death, she set herself heartily to
work to remedy the existing dangers, to resume the negotiations for
peace which had been begun by Eichard just before, and to complete
the pacification by detaching Philip from Arthur's side. And this
she succeeded in doing, although not without aid from other sources.
Philip had for the moment discarded the pretext of helping Arthur,
and was warring on his own account ; 5 the Angevins were thus
induced to throw themselves and their chosen count into the arms of
John ; the example was followed by a crowd of French nobles who
had quarrelled with Philip, and he himself was at the moment
threatened with an interdict.6 Taking advantage of the crisis, conclusion
Eleanor brought hastily from Spain her grand-daughter Blanche of in 1200
Castile, and, by the bestowal of a few Norman counties as her
marriage portion, John obtained a peace which lasted until Philip's
difficulties ended. Then in 1202 war broke out again ; Philip
declared John to be, as a contiimacious vassal,7 deprived of his fiefs ;

1 Hoveden, iv. 88. two writers at Fontevraud, whore

2 Hoveden, iv. 107, 114. Eleanor had invited the viscount to

3 On the 22nd of July, 1202, Eleanor visit her, and had obtained from him
had licence to dispose of her revenue a promise of fidelity to John. Hot.
by will : Rot. Pat. i. 14. A few days Chart, pp. 102, 103.

after, she was besieged in Mirabel 3 Hoveden, iv. (,K>. Philip's refusal

and rescued by John, on the 1st of to surrender Ballon to Arthur opened

August: II. Coggeshall, ed. Dnnkin, the eyes of the Angevins. The French

p. 210. malcontents were in treaty with John

4 There are two letters enrolled on before (ib. p. 95), as they had been
the Charter Rolls of 1201 of great with Richard.

interest; one from the viscount of 6 Hoveden, iv. 94, 112.

Thouars and another from Eleanor, 7 The summons was addressed to

both addressed to John, and giving an John as Philip's liegeman for Anjou

account of an interview between the and Poictou, and the day fixed for the

454

THE HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS OF

A ttack ft ml
extinction of
Ajthur

The Nonnnn
klnga lia<l
never ratal
without a
competitor

Arthur in the most foolish and wanton way attacked his grand-
mother at Mirabel ; there ho was defeated and taken by John ; * his
imprisonment at Falaise followed, and his final disappearance ;
which left the disaffected and alienated barons of Normandy no
alternative but the choice between Philip and John.2

And this was a state of things which had not existed since the
early days of William Rufus ; and even then, in Stephen of Aumale,
the Norman barons had found a competitor for their support in
rivalry with the son of the Bastard. Henry I. during the whole of
his reign knew that there was a strong party in favour of his
brother and nephew. Stephen and Matilda had fought out the
quarrel. Against Henry II. his own sons had been set up, and
John had been utilised to thwart and irritate Richard, as Arthur
in his turn had been used to rouse the fears and compel the good

second Sunday after Easter, 1202 ;
Bigord, p. 202 (ed. Bouquet, xvii. 54) ;
B. Coggeshall, p. 208 ; B. Wendover,
iii. 167. The sequence of events is
very obscure. According to William of
Armorica (Bouquet, xvii. 75), John
pledged two castles, Tillieres and
Botteavant, for his compliance with
the summons ; on John's non-appear-
ance the castles were seized. So also
Alberic of Trois Fontaines, p. 423.
Balph of Coggeshall asserts that the
summons was made at the suit of
Hugh le Brun and Balph of Eu, ' de
nimia infestatione,' p. 20S.

1 B. Coggeshall, pp. 210, 211 (ed.
Dunkin).

z Le Band, in his history of Brittany
(Paris, 1638), gives a circumstantial
account of the proceedings taken by
the Bretons on the news of the death
of Arthur : they assembled at Vannes
in great force, the historian naming
the barons and bishops who were
present. They determined to complain
to Philip, and sent by Bishop Peter of
Itennes a formal charge against John
demanding that he should be sum-
moned before a court of the peers of
France ; ' et, non comparant, fut fait
son procez Holemnellement, et par
cello Cour des Pers fut donnee contre
luy sentence diffinitive par arrest, de
la quelle il fut dit et declare' que pour
sa desloyaute, et pour son crime de
parricide et de majeptc leze. ton tea et
chncunes ses seigneuries qu'il tenoit
du dit Roy Philippe esloient et seroi-
ent confisquees A la coronne de France
et y furent uniea ' (p. 210). See also

Morice, Hist, de Bretagne, i. 132, who
says that the charge was made fifteen
days after the murder. Le Baud
quotes as his authority Robert Blondel,
who wrote the ' Reductio Normanniffi '
in the fifteenth century. This work
is published in the Rolls series : it
contains no mention of the matter;
and Le Baud's reference is probably to
Blondel's ' Oratio Historialis,' which
is yet in MS. The value of Le Baud's
account consists simply in its circum-
stantial character. Knighton, c. 2420,
gives the same account less circum-
stantially, but without date. The
earliest statement seems to be that
contained in Lewis's proclamation, in
1216, Feed. i. 140; 'satis notum est
quomodo de murdro Arturi nepotis sui.
in curia karissimi domini regis
Franciaa, cujus ambo erant homines
ligii, per pares suos citatus et per
eosdem pares tandem condempnatus.'
See Wendover, iii. 373 ; M. Paris,
p. 283. The second process must have
taken place in 1203, where it is placed
in the Chronicle of Lanercost, p. 2.
4 Rex Johannes citatus ad parliamen-
tuin super forisfacturis suis et semper
procrastinans, tandem ibi conventus,
Normanniam pro nece innocentis
nmisit.' If Arthur's death was
believed to have occurred in Holy
Week, 1203 (Apr. 3, Ann. Margam.
27). and Philip's march began a fort
night after Easter (Rigord, 204), the
date may be closely approximated to.
The account of the trial in the Mar-
gam Annals is noteworthy.

WALTER OF COVENTRY

455

behaviour of John. The disappearance or death of Arthur not only
shocked the Norman and English nobles, who were now far advanced
beyond the barbarism which had tolerated the brutal cruelties of
Henry I. ; but it also showed them that they must face for the first
time a king who would rule without a competitor. Among the
descendants of Henry in the female line there was not as yet anyone
recognised as fit to succeed on John's defeasance. The Saxon dukes
had claims enough of their own to struggle for. Raymond of
Toulouse was out of the question. King Alfonso was too far away,
and his rights had devolved (so the French said) on his daughter ;
and to accept Lewis was the same thing as to accept Philip. And
this the Normans seem to have thought the best course ; a series of
defections begins immediately on Arthur's capture. John showed
no intention of repelling the attacks of Philip, and his English
barons took leave of him in shame and disgust. The second sentence
of forfeiture issued by Philip, a thing which in ordinary times would
have roused the vassals to an indignant assertion of the rights of
their lord, seems to have had now the effect of an ecclesiastical ex-
communication. It paralysed -John's few friends, and gave his
many enemies the excuse for desertion or open hostility which they
were anxiously seeking. In the meantime the southern provinces
were bitterly provoked by the circumstances of John's second mar-
riage, and only the life of Eleanor stood between him and entire
forfeiture there also.1

It is unfortunate that the historians have not preserved the dates
of the death of Arthur and the second sentence of forfeiture. It
seems, however, certain that Eleanor, who died in the spring of

The barons
have no
choice b«t
between
John and
Philip

Second sen-
tence of
forfeiture

Alienation
of the south

Eleanor dies
in 1204

1 Eleanor made over Poictou to
John as her heir in September 1199,
Rot. Chart, p. 30 ; but wisely received
his homage for it, so that during her
life there could be no hazard of for-
feiture to the suzerain. She had pre-
viously the same year done homage
for it to Philip : Rigord, ap. Bouquet,
xvii. 50. The possession of the fief
of Poictou must always have been com-
plicated by its union with the duchy
of Aquitaine. Richard had been
made both duke and count in 1176 or
1179, whether or not to the exclusion
of his mother's title : but in 1185 he
had been compelled to restore Poictou
and probably the duchy also to his
mother. Her rights, whether lost for
the time or not, reverted to her at
the end of his reign. During that reign,
however, she was still duchess of

Aquitaine, Richard was also duke, and
under him Otho vas count of Poictou.
On Richard's death, Otho's tenure
being supposed to lapse at his election
in Germany, she renewed her own
title by doing homage to Philip (for
the duchy), and then received that of
John as count. Yet John also calls
himself duke of Aquitaine. It would
be tedious, if not uninteresting, to
work out the legal bearing of the seve-
ral titles, all different, by which the
duchy of Normandy, the counties of
Anjou and Maine, and the duchy of
Aquitaine and county of Poictou, were
held ; certainly the legal difficulties
were much greater than Philip's hasty
sentences of forfeiture could solve ;
John did homage to Philip for Brit-
tany as well as for his other lands in
1200, R. Coggeshall, 172.

456

THE HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS OF

Decline of
John'* for-
toned In

Kr.m.v

He throws
away Nor-
mandy

The Nor-
mans were
more closely
connected
with Eng-
land than
with France

Absence of
any feeling
for John in
Normandy

1204, must have survived both events ; but we lose sight of her
personal action after the battle of Mirabel.1 John's fortunes in
France could not survive his contemptuous negligence ; after that
victory his vanity became insufferable, and when he had alienated
the barons by whose sword and counsel it was won it became
contemptible. The whole of his continental dominion slipped out of
his hand.2 The grand inheritance of the sons of Hollo ; the con-
quests of William in Maine and the Vexin ; all the peculations of
the Angevins in Brittany and Touraine ; the coveted and but lately
secured superiority of Brittany : all that Henry and Richard had
plotted and fought for, was lost without one strong blow struck to
save it. And it was lost needlessly ; notwithstanding the turbulent
insubordination which was inherent in the Norman baronage, so
many of them still had estates in England that, at the very lowest
estimate, revolt must have cost them dear ; all the relations of the
clergy were with England rather than with France : the commons
of Normandy had enjoyed under their dukes a semblance of English
liberty. Henry II. had legislated for Normandy as well as for
England, 3 and had never touched the rights that set the free
Norman, on most social and legal points, far above the mere French-
man. Nor could the hostility of three centuries, during which
Norman and Frenchman had been continuously struggling, have
failed to create an abiding feeling of separate interests and traditions.
But neither self-interest nor sentiment availed to save John. The
great families began to divide their heritages : the French estates,
impoverished by neglect and non-residence, might go to the younger
sons and cousins, if they could avoid forfeiture ; and they might do

1 The date of Eleanor's death is
given by Sandford (p. 60) as June 26,
1202, at Mirabel, the year being cer-
tainly two years wrong. The day
seems to depend on an entry in the
Necrology of the monastery of Font-
evraud, printed in Bouquet among the
notes to Ralph of Coggeshall, vol.
xviii. p. 98. The Annals of Waverley,
however, say distinctly (p. 256),
' Alienor regina obiit in kalendis
Aprilis.' And this would seem to be
the true date, for John, in an ordi-
nance for the bakers of Winchester
(Rot. Pat. i. 41), issued April 15, 1204,
says, ' facta est autem haec constitutio
ad Pascha proximum post obitum
Alienoraa Reginae mains meae.' Easter
fell on the 25th of April in 1204. On
the 2nd of May John confirms a gift
to Fontcvraud 'pro salute animec
Alienorse Reginse,' Rot. Chart, p. 127.

• When the castellans of Normandy
applied to him in 1204, ' per nuncios
significavit omnibus, ut nulluin ab
ipso exspectarent aux ilium, sed
facerent singuli quod sibi melius
videbatur.' Wendover, iii. 181 ; M.
Paris, 212.

1 See the passage quoted from
Robert de Monte in the preface to
Benedict, vol. ii. p. lix (U.S.), which
shows that Henry was employed in
legal reforms in Normandy as early
as 1160. Geoffrey's ordinance on
primogeniture in Brittany is also
probably his handiwork. The simila-
rities and differences between Norman
and English law at the middle of the
thirteenth century will be seen well
illustrated in the Codex Legwn Nor-
numnicartim. printed in J. P. de
Ludewig's Reliquiae Manuscriptorum,
vol vii. pp. 149 418.

WALTER OF COVENTRY

457

homage to King Philip : l the English barons were rich enough to
spare their Norman farms, and not unwilling to escape the responsi-
bility of defending them. The great earls could make their own
bargains ; 2 the bishops,3 the slowest to move because safest and
strongest in neutrality, made no sign of adhesion to the fallen house.
The two limbs of the great inheritance parted without a struggle.
In Anjou and Touraine there was not even a sign of reluctance ; 4 no
great English estates had been accumulated by the barons of those
lands, nor had their separation from the body of France ever been so
complete as that of Normandy. Aquitaine, with the exception of
Gascony, went for the moment the same way.0

Thus the territorial work of the Conquest was undone.6 With John's loss
how great advantage to the English it is unnecessary now to work mandy'un-
out at length. It is sufficient to observe that the kings could no tutorial
longer look on Normandy as their natural home, but found them- ^°[^ the
selves obliged to live face to face with their people. The people, Conqueror
gaining strength at the same time from other causes, learned to look
with less tolerance on the vices, and to endure with less patience the
extortions, of the kings. The long-existing confusion between the
duties of the barons as English and as Norman feudatories ceased :

1 A list of the barons of Normandy
who, like Baldwin Wake, adhered to
John ; who like the Hommets adhered
to Philip ; or like the Longchamps
divided into branches, would be an
invaluable help to the reading of the
earlier as well as the later history :
and considerable materials for it are
already in print in the Eotidi Nor-
mannicB of Stapleton, and in the Rolls
of the Reign of John, edited by Sir
T. D. Hardy, especially the Rotuli
NormannicB, i. 122-143. The county
of Aumale is the best known and most
curious instance of the effects of the
change of lords : the conquest of Nor-
mandy having turned the English
estates of the dignity into an English
earldom with a foreign title, the earl-
dom of Albemarle.

- The earl of Chester received Rich-
mond and Dovedale in compensation
for his Norman estates : Ann. Wigorn.

3 Among them Walter of Cou-
tances, whose early career was entirely
English, who had been vice-chancellor,
bishop, and justiciar in England ;
Henry do Beaumont of Bayeux, who
had been on the closest terms with
Henry II. and Geoffrey of York, and
was a kinsman of the earls of Leices-
ter and Warwick ; and Jordan de

Humet of Lisieux, a member of the
family which gave constables to Nor-
mandy under Henry and Richard.

4 W. Cov. ii. 197. ' Johannes quippe
a suis destitutus Normannia recesse-
rat.' It is one story of mutual mistrust ;
the garrison of Andeli surrendered
' eo quod de subventione regis sui
diffidebant.' John could bring them
no succour, ' eo quod suorum prodi-
tionem semper timeret.' R. Cogges-
hall, 217, 218. Rouen and Verneuil
were lost for the same reason, ' eo
quod quorunda.n suorum proditionem
suspectam haberet.' Ib. 219. This
seems on some occasions to have
amounted to a panic on the king's
part ; as when he shut himself up for a
fortnight in Nottingham castle : Ann.
Margam, 32. The story is repeated
again in 1214 in Poictou, where Wen-
dover amusingly describes John and
Lewis, both at the head of strong
armies, running away from each other.
Wend. iii. 287 ; M. Paris, 250.

5 R. Coggeshall (ed. Dunkin), p.
220 ; W. Cov. ii.

6 The prophecy of Merlin was ful-
filled. ' Gladius a sceptro separatus
est.' R. Cogg. p. 219 ; Ann. Wigorn.
p. 407.

-ir.s

THE HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS OF

BeneflU
arising to
England
from the

separation

The death of
Archbishop
Hubert
eatisea the
breach be-
tween John
and the
clergy

Great repu-
tation and
ability of
Hubert

HulMjrt's
services to
John

the constant influx of foreigners regarded as half English because
they were Norman was stopped ; and England began to be ruled
more distinctly on national principles, for English purposes and by
Englishmen. The crown became more distinctly dependent on the
goodwill of the nation, and the nation became, more than it had
been since the Conquest, both in church and state, in law and
revenue, in war and peace, distinctly conscious of its unity, and, so
to speak, of its personal identity. The fusion of the races was
accomplished under Henry II. ; but the loss of Normandy had the
effect of separating the consolidated mass from the extraneous
matter which was still mechanically attached to it.

The death of Eleanor, who had impersonated and concentrated
the political influence of the family in France and on the continent
generally, was followed in little more than a year by that of the
archbishop Hubert Walter, who had played the Lanfranc to the
second Rufus. The parallel is by no means merely superficial,
different as were the antecedents and the characters, probably, of the
two prelates. As Lanfranc had placed William Rufus on the
English throne l in spite of the deficiency of title and the opposition
of a considerable body of nobles who maintained the rights of
the heir, so Hubert had secured the succession of John. And the
authority which Lanfranc as long as he lived exercised over William,
Hubert exercised as long as he lived over John : by personal influence
with him he repressed his more extreme attempts at tyranny,' and
by his influence with the baronage he obtained the most patient
toleration, and put the best colour on the character, of his acts.
Hubert had done this in the affairs of the state as well as in those of
the church. As finance minister to Richard he had learned how the
country could be taxed with the least outcry and with the greatest
profit ; and of the credit which his financial successes procured him
he had availed himsalf to improve the facilities for the administration
of justice, and to secure the promotion of good men.3 Richard had
had an unfeigned respect for him, earned no doubt by the common
endurance of great perils and privations in Palestine, and by the
services which had gained the regard of Saladin in the East 4 and
Henry VI. in the West.

Everything that Hubert had done for Richard he had done for
John, having as chancellor even a more intimate intercourse with
him and more constant occasion for remonstrance and reproof.

1 Eadmer (ed. Selden), pp. 13, 14.

• As, for example, in his attack on
the Cistercians in 1200 : It. Coggeshall,
p. 181.

1 Hoveden, above, pp. 186-199.

4 Itiner. R. Ricardi, p. 437. ' Tarn
in militia transnwrina quam in regi-
mine sancto sedis Cantuariensis
ecclesiaa floruerat.' R. Coggeshall,
p. 234.

WALTER OF COVENTEY 459

John might have been sensible of the merits, ungrateful as he was
for the support of Hubert, for notwithstanding the decisive line that
he had taken against him when in arms against Eichard, he had
never maintained, as William Longchamp had done, the claims of
Arthur to the English succession : he, as his uncle Eanulf Glanvill
had been,1 seems to have become through old association at Henry's
court, and perhaps by the unconscious influence of the king's
affection for his youngest son, personally attached to John ; and his
brother Theobald, the chief butler of Ireland, was one of John's
ministers long before he came to the crown. But John was
incapable of gratitude as of every other better sentiment. He had
felt the indispensable and irrefutable counsels of the archbishop to
be a curb on his instinct for unbridled tyranny.

There are indications that Hubert's influence was on the wane in His influence
political affairs before his death. But the immediate result of it — before his*1
and it is this that gives force to the parallel with Lanfranc — was the Hhfdeath
rupture of that tacit concordat between the hierarchy and the ^g^;,,.
sovereign which had been instituted by the Conqueror and his great the break-up

J D of the cou-

adviser, and which had, with the two great exceptions of S. Anselm cordat be-
and S. Thomas, been maintained by the representative men of the and clergy
church for a century and a half.

The principle of this arrangement had been the permission of as Relation of
much spiritual and ecclesiastical liberty to the clergy as was con- sta'bMmder
sistent with the fulfilment of the obligations of citizenship, as ^ornmi1
understood under a mainly feudal constitution. The Anglo-Saxon
system had been too hierarchical. In that respect, as in some others,
it was possible only in a state in which the differences of race and
religious and political views were few. The Danes had accepted it as
a part of English Christianity ; but the Norman Conquest introduced
a foreign race, a foreign baronage, and a hierarchy obnoxious to the church
influences of the Hildebrandine awakening. And it was to meet Wli181£nfth'fe
this that the king and archbishop on the one hand organised the ^q^™r
spiritual courts as distinct from the secular, whilst on the other franc
hand they bound the conquered and the conquerors by the feudal
tie, covering uniformly the ecclesiastical as well as the merely
territorial relations. The bishops became on the one side barons
and on the other free and spiritual judges ; as barons they were
bound to the feudal obligations, as spiritual judges they claimed for
themselves and for their clergy immunity from the secular tribunals.
Such a concordat left, however, very many points unsettled, especially
that of election to bishoprics, which had been the bone of contention
in all the countries of the West, and was ultimately settled, on different

1 Gir. Camb. Exp. Hib. p. 380.

460

THE HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS OF

KlccUon of
bishop* left
to the good
understand-
ing between
king and
priinate

Duly one
aerioua dis-
pute, before
the reign of
Henry IL

Hubert's
<leath pecu-
liarly unfor-
tunate in
this point

IU effects
still more
extensive
and impor-
tant

Hitherto the
clergy had
adhered to
the king
against the
feudatories

principles and in the course of many centuries, according to the
particular circumstances of each national church. It was in England
left to the good understanding between the king and the higher
clergy, heing in theory free, hut in practice a matter of arrangement
between the king, the chapters, and the consecrating primate : and
of course a pacific carrying out of such an arrangement required
delicate handling on the part of each.

It had been in the main a successful device, although in the
Norman reigns the terrors of the king's court had at least as much
to do with the submission of the chapters as had the manipulation
of the archbishop. The only serious case of disputed election which
had yet occurred was that to York ' in the reign of Stephen, at a
moment when the king was very weak, when the emancipation of
the disputed see from the obedience of Canterbury had been just
vindicated, and when the hands of both king and archbishop were
tied by the legation of Henry of Winchester. The death of Hubert
Walter not only made the vacancy which proved the object of con-
tention, but removed the influence by which only the contention
could under other circumstances have been allayed.

It is necessary, however, to take a wider view of the circumstances,
and to regard the extent to which the quarrel that followed Hubert's
death was the break-up of the old relations between the church and
the Crown. The particular circumstances are in this aspect less
important ; indeed the power of monasticism — and it was monasticisni
that provoked the struggle — was so much on the wane that it ceases
henceforth to be one of the motive forces or colouring influences of
English political history.2

During the long struggle which the Norman kings and their
successors had waged against aggressive feudalism, the clergy had
stood almost to a man on the royal side. In the best of them, nay
in the great majority, it is probable that this attitude was suggested
by the conviction that the strength of the king was the salvation of
the people. With this mingled, no doubt to a large extent, the
desire of vindicating their class immunities, which could only be done
by making their support valuable to the king ; but much more than
this is implied in their constant maintenance of the Crown against
the great feudatories. It was not this that placed S. Wulfstan at
the head of the Worcestershire fyrd to put down the rebellion of the
earls ; 3 or that kept the bishops faithful to William Rufus and
Henry I. ; or that united the whole of the clergy in the support of

' See the account in John of
Hexham (ed. Twysden), cc. 269, sqq. ;
Tho. Htubbs, cc. 1721, 1722; Will.
Newb. lib. i. cc. 17, 26 ; Raine, Fasti

Ebor. i. 210-233.

* See preface to Epistt. Cuntimr.
above, pp. 436-38.

• Flor. W. ap. W. Covent. i. 91.

WALTER OF COVENTRY 461

Henry II. against his sons. The victory of the barons would, as they Employ-
saw, have been at that time the destruction of the people. From this ™cai minis-"
resulted the constant employment, by the early kings, of clerical Normanhe
ministers ; and their monopoly of state offices of course increased the kings
attachment of the prelates to the Crown as the fountain of honour,
profit, and power. Not only were bishoprics the appropriate reward
of official labours, but bishops were felt by the kings to have so many
interests in common with themselves that they were the safest men
to trust. And even the great quarrels with Anselm and Becket did The bishops
not interrupt this relation ; for although after Becket's desertion (as sympathised
Henry deemed it) of the royal cause the king tried to commit him- oV^ecket61"1
self less and less to the bishops as state servants,1 and to educate a
legal nobility of his own to take their place, the bishops supported
the Crown against their primates in the latter case as much as in the
former ; and the archbishops found more sympathy among the
barons than among their brethren. Nor should it have been other-
wise so long as the primates were, with the highest motives it may
well have been, risking the destruction of national in defence of
ecclesiastical liberties. What is true of the bishops is true for other The lower
reasons of the lower clergy, who, mostly of English birth and in faithful to
thorough sympathy with their flocks, viewed the aggressions of the
baronage with terror and hatred, and on every occasion supported
the government against them. The monks also had until the middle
of the twelfth century maintained a national attitude ; 2 but from the The monks
reign of Stephen, partly in consequence of the great increase of maintain a
foundations by barons, who took this method of compounding for attitude
their religious duties, and partly because they felt that their obliga-
tions to the papacy were stricter than either to the king or to the
nation, they either became neutral or tried to thwart the royal policy
with respect to the church. Notwithstanding great local influence Rivalry of
they were opposed in view and interest to the seculars, whom on regulars a"'
every occasion they misrepresented, and out of whose revenues they
were endowed.

But the days were come in which a continuance of this relation Reforms of
was no longer possible. Henry II. had not only humiliated the
feudal baronage, but created a new one from the ministerial houses,
free from the traditions of French feudalism. The machinery of
government had been so arranged as very largely to increase the
safety and comfort of society, the speedy attainment of justice, and
the education of the people in its administration. But the power of
the sovereign had enormously increased at the same time and by the
same causes, and no adequate checks upon its still further growth
were provided in the new system, which had been devised by a royal
1 Bened. i. 34G. - Epp. Cantuar. above, pp. 370-?:>.

462

THE HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS OF

brain and carried out by men who saw in the royal power the only
safeguard of the church and people. Such power had been safely
intrusted to the great monarch who created it, and who throughout
his life felt the restraining influence of the old checks which actually
he had destroyed. And even Richard, who had spent so few days
during his whole reign in England, and had administered the govern-
ment by safe men, had possessed this power, masked though it may
have been in the using. But John stood face to face with his people,
an unmitigated tyrant ; a sovereign whose power no constitutional
limits as yet restricted, and whom no scruples, no counsel, held back
in the exercise, the abusive exercise, of it. The ecclesiastical struggle
of his reign comes in, then, most happily to break the old connexion,
to make it impossible for the church to become the tool of a despotic
king ; and perhaps no less shock would have sufficed.

From this date the clergy had to choose between the Crown and
the nation, and they chose the side of the nation; in spite of or
irrespective of the attitude of the papacy, sometimes in sympathy
with it and sometimes in opposition to it, they maintained the cause
of liberty hand in hand with the barons against the king, as they
had before maintained the cause of liberty hand in hand with the
king against the barons. Stephen Langton, S. Edmund, Robert
Grosteste, Adam Marsh, the Cantilupes, Robert Winchelsey, John
Stratford, and William of Wykeham, although men of very different
character, struggling in the most dissimilar circumstances and for
the most dissimilar proximate ends, form a string of episcopal
statesmen whose claims on national gratitude nothing but pro-
fessional jealousy can overlook or disparage. After the wars of the
Roses the constitutional cycle recurs ; again the baronage is
annihilated and the king becomes all-powerful ; but then, most
unfortunately, the prelates, unsupported either by a new nobility or
by a strong and righteous policy at Rome, placed themselves at the
mercy of the Crown ; the balance of the estates was overthrown,
never to be restored, and England after the fall of Wolsey saw both
her political and her religious constitution made the plaything and
victim of a tyrant.

When, however, we say that the church struggle of John's reign
was in its result a happy thing for English liberty, it must not be
forgotten that the parties who waged the struggle were by no means
conscious of the line which events were taking, nor even contem-
plated the result as a contingency. The baronage in particular,
although their turn in the battle was to begin as soon as that of the
clergy was over, do not seem in the least to have anticipated it.1

' ' Orta est statim discordia inter
papam Iimocentium et Jobannein

tyrannum Anglise, faventibus ei et
consenticntibus omnibus laicis et

WALTER OF COVENTEY 463

They had their grievances, but they saw no connexion between them Probable
and the clerical grievances : did not even see that the victory which their "u-
should place the church under the king's feet would make him too p
strong for them to resist. And it is probable that they were not
much to blame in this, for in the first place the adroit management
of Hubert Walter had covered many of John's worst faults, and the
loss of Normandy, which had occupied the king's time largely up to
the year 1205, had only just become a certainty ; but, secondly, the
circumstances of the ecclesiastical quarrel were not such as to invite
the sympathies of men like the barons, who had been brought up in
the principles of the Constitutions of Clarendon, and saw in appeals
to Borne a breach of national organisation, in the triumph of Inno-
cent III. an unprecedented national humiliation. As the struggle
proceeded, it was only those of them who had a real zeal for righteous-
ness that would move to thwart the king, who by his usurpation
of ecclesiastical revenue was enabled to dispense with heavy
general taxation, or that would incur the risk of the injuries which
he never hesitated to inflict. The suspension of general taxation
must have been really the secret how the king was able to prolong
the struggle. The people were under interdict, but the pecuniary The people
burdens were comparatively light.1 And the interdict was probably interdict
observed but loosely2 after the flight of the bishops. The great nhSty1"'1

clericis fere universis, sed et viris may say the offices of the dead in pri-

cujuslibet professionis multis.' Ann. vate houses. The chief burden was of

Margam, p. 28. course the cessation of the Eucha-

1 Or, to put it in the homely way ristic service, the closing of the
of the monastic annals, ann. 1209, churches and churchyards to the laity,
' Magna tribulatio fuit hoc anno et and the prohibition of the ceremonies
prseterito super omnes ecclesiasticas of marriage and extreme unction,
personas quia a cura Christianitatis Marriages, however, according to the
omnes fere laici pedem reflectebant ; Annals of Dunstable, did take place
sed victualium plena fuit abundantia.' in the porches of the churches, and
Ann. Wigorn. 397. the viaticum was given to the dying.

2 Roger of Wendover states that it In another letter (Ep. xi. 102), dated
was strictly kept, iii. 222. See also June 14, 1208, the pope allows the use
Gesla Innoc. iii. c. 131 : but this of chrism in baptism, the old, if new
must not be strictly interpreted, cf. cannot begot ; in the case of the dying,
Ann. Dunst. ed. Luard, p. 30. And where the viaticum cannot be ob-
even better evidence exists in the tained, ' in hoc casu credimus obtinere,
letters of Innocent himself. One of " Crede et manducasti," ' and greatest
these (Martene and Durand, The- of all, ' si tamen viris religiosis ab
saurus, i. 810) contains the forma initio licuisset juxta suorum privile-
interdicti. Prayers are to be said and giorum tenorem, exclusis excommuni-
sermons preached on Sundays in the catis et interdictis, clausis januis, non
churchyards ; baptisms are to be per- pulsatis campanis, suppressa voce
formed with full service, but in private divitia qfflcia celebrare, nee nobis
houses ; confessions may be said as fuisset molestum, nee absonum ex-
usual ; burials are forbidden in the stitisset : possetque per illud tarn in
churchyards, but may be performed hoc quam in aliis congruum remedium
anywhere else ; the priests may not aclhiberi, prfesertim ut per oblationem
attend the funerals of the laity, but hostia; salutaris Divina placaretur in

464

THE HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS OF

Conduct of
Innocent
and John

John was
enidually
drawn into
his extreme
position

Innocent
followed the
traditional
policy of the
Curia

confiscations affected the prelates far more than the parochial clergy,
and the latter would in many cases prefer the spiritual welfare of
their flocks to a hazardous compliance with the papal sentence. But
even if it were not so, it is not to be supposed that the majority of
an uneducated population would balance the loss of religious rites
against a comparative freedom from taxation such as seems to have
prevailed from 1208 to 1218. To this we may attribute the absence
of anything like a popular rebellion, and the postponement of the
general rising until the end of the religious struggle ; the influence
of the chief ministers, Geoffrey Fitz Peter and William Marshall, both
of them men of great experience and great territorial importance,
being unquestionably both exercised and felt. But some caution
is necessary in speaking of the financial history of these years,
because our records and chronicles furnish us with but little trust-
worthy or exact information upon it.

It is not, however, difficult to form an accurate estimate on the
two points which have been most frequently controverted in relation
to this crisis of our history : the conduct and policy of Innocent III.
and the conduct and policy of John. In John's conduct there is no
occasion to suspect any special criminality greater than imprudent
levity and wilful obstinacy in the treatment of a matter of the
highest constitutional importance. It is a signal illustration of the
extreme measures into which an unprincipled man may be drawn,
without any definitely malicious intention, by his own lack of counsel
and unscrupulousness in circumstances which require patient, con-
scientious, and yet politic treatment. There is no reason to suppose
that John had conceived, or was capable of conceiving, a deliberate
plan for suppressing the liberty of the church or throwing off the
influence of the pope ; at the worst his design in the first in-
stance was but to place a creature of his own on the archiepiscopal
throne, a measure which was-only twice attempted during the middle
ages by any English sovereign, and in both instances with the
greatest danger to the state. And on the other side we should not
exaggerate the aggressiveness of Innocent III. The curiously
elaborate and persistent policy of the court of Rome has invested
that body, in the mind of historians and politicians, with a sort of
personal idiosyncrasy, which is very slightly affected by the special
characteristics of the individual who happens to be pope ; and so
with one school the papacy is a standing conspiracy against the

hac necessitate majestas.' Where
privileged orders and monasteries were
so many, the hearing of mass must
have been within the power of most
people, see Ann. Oseney, p. 54 ; Wi-
gorn. :-J97 ; W. Cov. ii. 201, 205 ; Wil-

kins, Cone. i. 526 ; but at the worst,
the observance of the interdict would
not reduce the mean religious services
below the model voluntarily adopted
by some Protestant communities at
the present day.

WALTER OF COVENTRY 465

freedom of mankind, with another a divinely guided organisation
for the religious regeneration and moral discipline of the world.
And thus sometimes it seems as if there were very little difference
between the ecclesiastical acts of a good pope and those of a bad
one. But it is quite unnecessary to antedate the existence of the Neither of
political system of the Jesuits, or to suppose a definitely elaborated tempiated
plan of aggression even in a far-seeing pontiff like Hildebrand or his result*"8
most successful follower. Innocent III. in 1205 no more thought
of reducing England to the condition of a fief of the Apostolic See
than John did of enriching himself with the spoils of the bishops.
But the Roman court has a policy in which Innocent himself had
been educated, and of which he is, perhaps in all medieval history,
the most illustrious exponent : the policy of never overlooking an
advantage, or any course of events which might be turned to advan-
tage to the Roman court. In England, where, as we have seen,
the secular clergy had until now been consistently ranked on the
royal side in questions of church and state alike, the monastic
interest was that which it was most important for the papacy to
promote ; for the monastic interest was most opposed to the
authority of the bishops, most ready to appeal against the Crown,
most influential among the people, and both from traditionary
religious feeling and from the hope of advantage most kindly dis-
posed to Rome. The monastic interest in England was moreover
now in close communication with the monastic interest on the con-
tinent, where it was fighting with varied circumstances the same
battle.1

It was most unfortunate for John that he had to deal with such T1!e ^'°
a man as Innocent III. So sound and astute a lawyer, so ingenious actors in the
and plausible a politician, so high-principled a man, acting in behalf wenffii-
of a cause in which he entirely believed, was unlikely either to leave n
an opening for his own discomfiture, or to spare the exercise of the
power which he thought he was using beneficially, when his own
opportunity came. But he neither made nor snatched at the oppor-
tunity ; every step of his proceeding was strictly legal, and if in the
decisive act of the struggle, the election of Langton, his legality
verges on captiousness or chicanery, it must be remembered that his
course was provoked by the detected fraud of John. If Innocent
had had to deal with Henry II., or even with Hubert Walter, he
would have been met with his own weapons : the delays and evasions
of the canon law would have been made serviceable on both sides ;
the crisis would have been staved off, and the result almost certainly
would have been a compromise. John's policy in the matter was

' See Epp. Cantuar. above, pp. 386, sq.

H H

466

THE HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS OF

• (•*•• :•>•

foand hU
moet tempt-
ing oppor-

t unit if* in
John's folly

Disputed
election to
the tee of
Canterbury

John tries
to influence
the final
decision
whilst the
appeals are
pending

simply the blundering, floundering, pettifogging, obstinate, and yet
irresolute procedure of a violent man, devoid of real courage or
counsel, and ignorant of the strength of his cause. It is unnecessary
to enter into the details, but a clear notion of the string of the story
is indispensable.

Hubert Walter died July 12, 1205 ; before he was buried,1 the
younger monks of Canterbury, without asking the royal licence,
elected their subprior Reginald to succeed him, enthroned him and
sent him to Rome for confirmation, with strict injunctions of
secrecy as to the purpose of his journey. Reginald as soon as he
landed in Flanders, announced himself as the archbishop elect and
so exposed the plot. The news reached England in due time ; the
king was enraged ; the bishops were provoked at the contempt of
their claim to share in the election ; and the monks frightened at their
own temerity, and divided into two factions. The bishops appealed
to Rome on behalf of their rights, and the monks appealed on
bahalf of theirs.2 John announced his intention of nominating
John Gray, bishop of Norwich, and both the bishops and the senior
party among the monks were ready to elect him. The king, un-
willing to wait for news from Rome, obtained in December from
the resident monks a renunciation of their appeal and transacted
the formal election, placed John Gray in possession of the archi-
episcopal revenues,3 and sent envoys to Rome to demand the papal
recognition.1 Here, then, John took his first false step; he had not

1 ' Antequam corpus ejus sepulturse
traderetur.' B. Wendover, iii. 183.

1 The agents of both the appealing
parties appeared before the pope before
any mention was made of the election
of the bishop of Norwich ; a deputation
of five monks from the convent and
Master Peter of Inglesham on behalf
of the bishops. Peter was robbed of
his credentials at Parma, but the pope
accepted a caution of 1,000 marks
from him, and the security of the
bishop of Winchester and Master John,
canon of S. Paul's, and admitted him
to a hearing. From his statement
the pope concluded that the election
of the subprior had been made (1) in
spite of an appeal ; (2) in con-
tempt of the rights of the bishops ;
and (3) in breach of engagement
made between the bishops and the
monks, to meet for the election on the
30th of November. Accordingly he
wrote to the abbots of Beading and
8. Alban's, and to the dean of S. Paul's,
to examine witnesses, and to send the

necessary persons and depositions to
Borne before the 1st of May, 1206.
Innoc. III. Epp. lib. viii. ep. 161, dated
Dec. 11, 1205. A few days before,
Dec. 8, he had written to the bishops,
ordering them not to molest the
monks. M. Paris, 212, 213.

1 M. Paris, 213 ; Wendover, iii. 186.

4 On the very day that Innocent
wrote for the witnesses, Dec. 11, John
wrote to him, saying that both parties
had on Dec. 6 renounced their appeals ;
he had himself gone to Canterbury on
the following Sunday, and then and
there the monks, acting with his con-
sent, had elected John, bishop of
Norwich, to be archbishop. Bot. Pat.
Joh. i. 56. On the 20th of the same
month he sent to Borne Archdeacon
Honorius, Master Columb, Geoffrey of
Derham, and six monks of Canterbury,
on behalf of the bishop of Norwich,
and issued a letter to the bishops de-
siring their seals to a letter to the
pope for the same purpose. Rot. Pat.
i. 57.

WALTER OF COVENTRY 467

acted with sufficient promptness to stop the election and appeal of
the subprior, he had not patience to consider that no pope could
allow a suit that was brought before him to be stopped by the
renunciation of it in the king's court by men whose interest in it
was one of the points to be debated ; and he threw over the rights
of the bishops on which his father had always insisted, placing the
formal right unreservedly in the hands of the monks.1 Although,
then, three appeals may be said to have been pending, he acted in
contempt of them all, and yet forwarded a fourth appeal to the very
tribunal whose cherished jurisprudence he was ignoring. Innocent, innocent
on the other hand, accepted all the appeals, ignored the renunciations, supposition
and set to work to inform himself of the merits of the case, adjourn- appeais^re
ing the hearing of it from time to time,2 and urging on the several 6
parties concerned to prepare their evidence carefully and to accredit
their representatives with full power. John made a show of com- John tries
plying, but he forwarded with the evidence a large sum of money
to bribe the papal officials,3 and whilst he pretended to give the
monks whom he sent full powers to complete the election, and a
formal assent to any election they might make, he bound them
secretly to elect no one but Gray. The imbecile cunning of this
policy practised on a man like Innocent is very characteristic of
John. In the week before Christmas 1206 the cause was finally
heard, before the representatives of all the parties.4 The election of

1 Although he desired the bishops tine's are to see the mandate obeyed
to seal the letters on behalf of the (Epp. ix. 34). He also orders the suf-
bishop of Norwich, he distinctly says fragans to send their proctors, and re-
that the election was made by the quests the king to do the same (Epp.
prior and convent (ib. p. 56). 35, 36, 37). W. Cov. ii. 198.

2 On the 30th of March, 1206, Inno- 3 On the 8th of May, John writes
cent writes to the convent. After re- to the bishops desiring their seals to
hearsing his letter of Dec. 11, he the letters written by the bishops of
announces the arrival of Archdeacon London, Rochester, Winchester, Ely,
Honorius and his companions with and Norwich : Rot. Pat. i. 64. On the
the news of the election of John Gray ; 26th he gave letters of credit to 'the
the agent of the subprior had in- amount of 3,000 marks to Thomas of
sisted that that election should be Herdington and Anfrid of Dene, who
quashed, alleging that it was made were going to the court of Rome : Rot.
during appeal, that the person chosen Pat. i. 65. The letter which he wrote
was a stranger to the convent, and to the pope bears the same date : ibid,
that it was made under undue in- The abbot of Beaulieu followed, with
fluence. On the last ground he de- letters of credit for 40 marks only, on
dined to confirm the election. Arch- the 26th of August : ibid. 67. Of the
deacon Honorius then demanded the sum intrusted to them, the envoys
rejection of the claim of the sub- spent 2,025 marks before they re-
prior; and the latter having replied, turned.

the pope summons sixteen monks, * The letter condemning the claims

ten by name, and six to be named by of the bishops is in M. Paris, pp. 214,

the convent, with full powers to act Innoc. Epp. ix. 205, dated Dec. 20.

for the whole body, to appear at Rome The letter to the king announcing

on the 1st of October. The bishop of the definite sentence and the election

Rochester and the abbot of S. Augus- of Langton is in Innoc. Epp. ix. 206 ;

H H 2

468

THE HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS OF

Final deci-
sion of
Innocent

Stephen
Laiigton
elected by
the monks
at Koine

Strict
legality of
Innocent's
proceedings

He acts
leisurely,
but finally
take- his
own coarse

the subprior was annulled as informal ; the election of Bishop Gray
was also null because it had been transacted during the appeal ; the
claims of the bishops were condemned, as it would seem, on an
ex parti', statement at which the king had connived. The see was
therefore vacant ; and the only body that had a right to elect was plen-
arily represented at Rome, with the royal consent already obtained to
ratify their choice. It had been vacant now a year and a half, to the
great detriment of the church ; it was desirable that there should be no
more delay. The pope suggested Cardinal Stephen, an Englishman
and a scholar ; not a monk , but also no courtier. And the repre-
sentatives of the chapter, forgetful with one exception of their
secret bond to the king, elected the cardinal. We may strongly
suspect that Innocent knew both of the corrupt arrangement by
which he was to be hoodwinked, and of the bribes that were lavishly
spent on his kinsmen :l it is probable also that he regarded Bishop
Gray as a mere creature of the king, and was anxious for the sake
of the church to place in the seat of Augustine the first scholar of
the first University of Christendom, a man on whom he could
rely in the interests of religion, and whom John himself respected
so much that he thrice congratulated him by letter on his elevation
to the Cardinalate.2 But he did nothing in haste, nothing under-
hand, or in defiance of the common understanding between the
Christian princes and their spiritual guide. Where he verges to-
wards over-legality, it is that he may defeat fraud. Nor when
Langton was elected did he proceed hastily ; he would not consecrate
him before he had attempted to obtain from John a real instead of

and that to the monks, nearly in the
same words, is in Innoc. Epp. ix. 207,
dated Dec. 21. In these the king's
envoys, the abbot of Beaulieu (Hugh,
afterwards bishop of Carlisle), Thomas
(of Herdington), sheriff of Stafford-
shire, and Anfrid (Dene), knight, are
mentioned. They refused to give the
royal assent ; but the deputation of
monks had full powers from the con-
vent. The pope writes at the request of
the king's envoys for an express assent,
although it was not necessary for an
election at Rome. The secret history
is told by Matthew Paris : ' Rex po-
suerat verbum suum in ore duodecim
monachorum Cantuariensium ut
quemcunque eligcrent ipse aocep-
taret. Convenerat autem inter regem
et eos, praostito juramento et fidei
interpositione, quod nullo modo alium
quam Johannem episcopum Norwicen-
sem eligerent. Habebant et similiter
regis litteras.' M. Paris, p. 222.

And this statement is, in one part at
least, abundantly confirmed by the
language of the Barnwell canon (Walt.
Cov. ii. 198) : ' a conventu Cantuariensi
et episcopis Anglife, necnon et a rege,
sufficienter esset cautum, quod eorum
apud sedem apostolicam acta rata
haberentur et indiscussa.'

1 The letters patent of Feb. 20, 1207
(Rot. Pat. i. 69), mention fees of 230
marks to Peter, son of Richard, the
pope's brother ; 60 marks to P. Han-
nibalis ; Stephen Rom. Cassolii, 50
marks ; and 20 marks to the nephew
of the bishop of Porto. The pension
was still paid to P. Hannibalis in
1214 (Rot. Pat. i. 108) : so also that
of Octavian Rom. Cassolii (ibid. p.
117).

1 So Innocent says in the letter
addressed to John, dated May 26,
1207. Wilkins, Cone. i. 517, 518;
Innoc. Epp. x. 219.

WALTER OF COVENTRY 469

the fraudulent assent to the act.1 John replied to the announcement
with an absolute refusal, supported only by special pleading and
unhesitating falsehood. He did not so much as know the obscure
person who was forced upon him.2 Then the successor of S. Peter
clad himself in the zeal that so well became him, and consecrated
the archbishop.3

John had thus contrived, not without cunning but without any John's want
true policy, to place hinself in the wrong in every possible way. He this°matt«T
had carried an appeal to a tribunal by whose decision he did not
intend to be bound ; he had attempted, by an illusory undertaking
on his own part and a corrupt bargain with his nominal opponents,
to deceive the judge, and such a judge as Innocent. The pope de-
feated him by treating him as if he were an honest man. Further,
he had failed ignominiously, he had lost the cause, he had wasted
his bribes, and he had been betrayed by his own tools.4 But even
now there were ways open by which a king like his father or a
minister like Hubert would have gained time, or even a reversal of
the sentence : even in Scotland William the Lion had managed to
keep a similar trial for ten years in suspense ; but John had not
self-command enough to temporise. He declared that no earthly
consideration should ever make him receive the archbishop, and
directed the severest measures to be taken for the punishment of the
monks.5 And it was this that provoked the pope to the use of that

1 This he asks for in the letter of two monks sent for the assent had
Dec. 21, Ep. ix. 206. been stopped at Dover, but that their

2 John's letter is known chiefly letters had been forwarded to the king
from the pope's answer, Epp. x. 219 : by his own messengers. He should
Wendover, 216; Wilkins, Cone. i. ask for that consent no more, but pro-
517. Wendover gives an abstract of ceed to do his duty. Langtou was
it, pp. 215, 216 ; M. Paris, 224. The consecrated at Viterbo on the 17th of
messengers would arrive home towards June, and the fact was announced in
the end of January. They were im- a letter to the convent dated June 24.
mediately despatched back again with Wilkins, i. 517.

recommendatory letters dated Feb. 4 ' Dixit enim quod in prsejudicium
20, and letters of credit of the same suas libertatis sine ipsius assensu
date for 2,000 marks, and a strict suppriorem suum elegerant, et post-
charge not to spend any of it, ' sicut modum, ut quod male gesscrant quasi
diligunt corpora sua, ante consumma- sibi satisfaciendo palliarent, elegerunt
tionem negotii pro quo remittuntur ad episcopum Norwicensem, et pecuniam
curiam.' They had also to give ac- de fisco accipientes ad itinens ex-
count of 1,000 marks which were still pensas, ut electionem de episcopo
in their hands. Rot. Pat. i. 69. memorato factam apud sedem aposto-

3 Innocent's letter in answer to licam impetrarent confirmari, in
John's threat is dated May 26 : cumulum iniqnitatis sute elegerunt ibi
Langton being not yet consecrated, Stephannmde Langetune.' Wendover,
Wilkins, Cone. i. 517. John had iii. 214 ; M. Paris, 223.

said that he had never received the s Fulk Cantilupe and Reginald oi

papal letters requiring him to send Cornhill were sent to Canterbury to

proctors, and had never been asked by seize the goods of the monks on the

the monks for his consent. The pope llth of July: Rot. Pat. i. 74. The

accounts for this by saying that the bishop of Worcester was also in

470

THE HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS OF

The Inter-
dict

John hc-i-

Utc- fcbOOt

recelrliiir
the arch-
biihop

Failure of
negotia-
tion-

most fearful and suicidal weapon of the medieval church, the interdict,
which was proclaimed in the spring of 1208.'

It is difficult to say with certainty what effect this produced on
the king who, although, without religion, was not without superstition ;
whether for the moment he was staggered in his resolution, or merely
dissembled in order to test the result of the cessation of religious
rites among the people generally : anyhow he offered to allow Langton
to receive the royalties of his see,2 and even gave him permission to
visit England provided that he were not expected to receive him as
a friend.3 But the pope suspected deceit in this ; the refusal to
receive Langton was too like Henry's refusal of a kiss to Becket.

trouble about the business : Rot.
Glaus, i. 92. Langton's prebend at
York was given away on Nov. 8 : ibid.
96.

1 On the 27th of August 1207 the
pope wrote to the bishops of London,
Ely, and Worcester, begging them to
use their influence to prevail on John
to receive Langton ; and ordering
them in case of his refusal to impose
an interdict, and threatening still
severer measures. Wilkins, Cone. i.
519;Innoc. Epp. x. 113. He had heard,
it would seem, already the hardships
of the monks. On the 19th of
November he wrote to the same pre-
lates to enforce the interdict (Wilkins,
Cone. i. 524) ; to the bishops generally,
reproving their inertness (ib. p. 523) ;
and to the barons, urging them to
advise the king to comply (ibid. 524 ;
Innoc. Epp. x. 159, 160, 161). On the
21st of January John signified to the
three bishops that he was willing to
comply : Rot. Pat. i. 78. On March 12
Simon Langton, who had had a safe-
conduct on the 19th of February, pre-
sented himself to the king at Winches-
ter, and prayed him to receive his
brother as archbishop ; and when the
king spoke of saving his own rights,
Simon insisted that he should place
himself altogether at the archbishop's
mercy. Such is the king's statement,
Rot. Pat. i. 80 (Mar. 4). The interdict
was formally proclaimed on the 23rd,
M. Paris, 226; or on the 24th, R.
Coggeshall, 238.

* The abbot of Beaulieu was again
the envoy, and had orders for his pas-
sage from Dover on the 4th of April,
ten days after the promulgation of the
interdict. The pope's letters in
answer are dated May 27. From these
we learn the proposals made through

the abbot. John was willing to accept
Stephen as archbishop and to rein-
state the monks : the royalties of the
see he placed in the pope's hands.
He could not, however, prevail on
himself to receive Stephen as a friend,
' nonduni animus tuus poterat incli-
nari ut familiarem eidem archiepi-
scopo gratiam exhiberes.' The pope
in reply urges him to confer the
royalties himself and receive the arch-
bishop's fealty ; if he still declines,
the bishops of London, Ely, and Wor-
cester are to receive the royalties and
confer them in the pope's name : Epp.
xi. 89, 90. At the same time he wrote
to the three bishops directing them,
when the terms of the agreement were
fulfilled, to relax the interdict : Epp.
xi. 91.

J On the 14th of July John granted
safe-conduct to Simon Langton and
the three bishops to pass to and fro
between Dover and the continent in
the process of negotiation until Sept.
8, Rot. Pat. i. 85 ; and this is renewed
for three weeks from Sept. 8, on the
llth of August, Rot. Pat. i. 82 ; on the
9th of September Stephen himself has
a safe-conduct from Sept. 29, for three
weeks, Rot. Pat. i. 86. This he did
not use, but the three bishops waited
in vain for two months for an inter-
view with John : Ann. Wav. 261.
Long before this, however, the pope's
suspicions as to John's sincerity were
aroused ; on the 22nd of August be
had written to the three bishops for-
bidding them to relax the interdict
until all promises were fulfilled : Epp.
xi. 141. See also R. Coggeshall ad
aim. 1208. 'Rex Anglorum misit
Romam et se satisfacturum . . . pro-
misit, sed minime tenuit ' (p. 238).

WALTEK OF COVENTKY

471

John was not the man to risk a second martyrdom, but there were
many ways of silencing an enemy besides murder. Langton came
to Dover, but all attempts at a reconciliation failed.1 John found
that the country bore the interdict with equanimity, or at least with
submission, and made or allowed no more advances towards recon-
ciliation.2 Then came the full burst of the storm ; the bishops,
relieved from their duties, fled from their flocksj and John seized
their revenues ; the inferior clergy were for a moment practically
outlawed and the convents reduced to starvation ; and although on
second thoughts the king interfered to protect the former, and allowed
a fraction of their income for the maintenance of the latter,3 the

John seizes
bishops

1 The news of the failure of nego-
tiations having reached Home, the
pope wrote to John on the 12th of
January 1209, and, distinctly imputing
to him the breaking off of the pacifi-
cation, insisted on his performing the
promises made by the abbot of Beau-
lieu. If this were not done within
three months after the receipt of this
letter, he is declared excommunicate,
and the three bishops are ordered
to publish and execute the sentence :
Epp.xi. 211 ; Wilkins, i. 528. At the
same time he wrote to the bishop of
Winchester enjoining on him to obey
the three bishops : Epp. xi. 218. He
had not, however, quite given up
hopes : for, writing to the archbishop
about the same time, he gives him
leave to modify the interdict and to
absolve the officers who had dispos-
sessed the monks of Canterbury : Epp.
xi. 216, 217; and on the 23rd of
January wrote a letter rather remon-
strating with the king than threaten-
ing him : Epp. xi. 221. The excommu-
nicatory letter, being enclosed in a
letter to the three bishops, was re-
garded as an ultimatum ; and that of
Jan. 23rd would reach the king first.
Simon Langton had on the 23rd of
March safe-conduct for three weeks
after Easter that he might confer with
the bishops of Winchester and Bath
and the justiciar on the pope's last
letter : Hot. Pat. i. 90. There is no
evidence of anything being done in
this interview. In the meantime the
bishops who had fled from England
committed the task of publishing the
excommunication to their brethren,
who of course declined to do so : M.
Paris, 228. On the 21st of June the
sentence was still unpublished, and

the pope wrote (Epp. xii. 57) to the
abbot of S. Vedast at Arras, em-
powering him to promulgate it in con-
junction with any two of the three
bishops, whenever the archbishop
should demand it. Soon after another
interview was proposed, and during
the preliminary negotiations matters
seem to have advanced so far that a
beginning of restitution was made :
Ann. Waverley, p. 263. It was other-
wise when the archbishop presented
himself at Dover, where he landed on
the 2nd of October. The king came
to Chilham on his way to meet him,
and sent the justiciar and the bishop
of Winchester to discuss matters with
him. These ministers refused to
ratify the articles drawn up in the
earlier stages of the business, and the
archbishop left without seeing the
king : Ann. Wav. 264. John made
another attempt soon after, summon-
ing the archbishop again to Dover.
But to this Stephen replied in a letter
still preserved (Wilkins, i. 529), re-
fusing to comply until the terms
before arranged were fulfilled, but
offering to see the king's agents at
Witsand or Gravelines. E. Cogges-
hall mentions an invitation sent by
John to the archbishop in 1210,
which failed because he did not give
a safe-conduct : p. 239 ; Ann. Winton.
81 ; Ann. Waverl. 266 ; W. Covent. it.
200. The excommunication, accord-
ing to the Annals of Dunstable, was
published in France but not in Eng-
land (p. 32).

- Especially after the quarrel of the
pope with Otho : W. Cov. ii. 202.

3 M. Paris, 226, 227. On the 6th of
April 1208 the king orders a reason-
able maintenance to be allowed to the

472

THK HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS OF

Intercourse
with Rome
was not at
first Stopped
by the
interdict

Sentence
issued
against
John

result of the infliction was in every way calamitous. Yet, strange to
say, whilst the people were perishing, negotiations on other matter**
wenton between England and Rome, though not without disturbance.1
The new bishop of Lincoln 2 sought confirmation from the pope and
consecration from Langton ; the machinery of the coui-t of final
appeal went on ; the nation was under interdict, but the king's
excommunication was suffered to be in suspense ; they perished, he
grew rich. At last in 1212 3 the special excommunication was pro-
nounced, and with it the sentence of deposition.4 Even against this

religious, Rot. Claus. i. 109, 110,
where several measures of confiscation
are ordered of lands seized on ac-
count of the interdict. The abbots of
Abingdon and Michelney are respited.
On the llth of April the king issues
an edict which shows the length to
which the outlawry of the religious
and thcr clergy had proceeded : ' Praa-
cipimus tibi quod clamari facias sine
dilatione per comitatum tuum, quod
nulli, sicut diligunt corpora et catalla
sua, malum faciant vel dicant viris
religiosis vel clericis contra pacem
nostram, et si quern inde attingere
possimus ad proximam quercum eum
suspendifaciemus.' Rot. Claus. i. 111.
See also W. Covent. ii. 200.

1 Not, of course, on so extensive a
scale as usual. But the letters of
Innocent III., if not misplaced and
misdated, show that long after the
interdict was proclaimed and the
sentence of excommunication issued
the pope was writing to John on the
claims of Berengaria : Epp. xi. 223.
He wrote also to the chapters of the
vacant churches, urging them to
elect : Epp. xi. 212 ; other business is
treated of in Epp. xi. 248 ; xii. 100,
166 ; xiii. 52, 74, 208 ; xv. 141.

* He went to France, according to
Wendover, to be consecrated by the
archbishop of Rouen, but went instead
to Langton. Several letters of Inno-
cent concern this election (Epp. xii. 56,
91).

1 In 1211, ' Reges et alios omnes
tarn panperes quam potentes, ad
coronam Angliae spectantcs, a regis
fidelitate et subjectione absolvit.' M.
Paris, 231; Wendover, iii. 237. In
1212 he issued the bull of deposition,
the execution being committed to
Philip. M. Paris, 232 ; Wendover, iii.
241 ; W. Cov. ii. 209.

4 According to the Annals of Wa-

verley (ed. Luard, p. 266), in 1211,
soon after 8. James's day, Pandulf
and Durund landed in England, and
on the Thursday after the feast of
S. Bartholomew held a conference
with the king at Northampton. The
conference is, however, placed both in
the Burton and in the Waverley
Annals in the year 1212 ; so that some
mistake is certain, and unfortunately
the Rolls of the year are missing. As,
however, John was at Northampton
on the 29th of August 1211, and not
at all during that month in 1212, the
conference, if it ever took place, must
have been in 1211 ; and with this
conclusion agree the words of the
Barnwell book (W. Cov. ii. 204):
' Duo nuncii a sede apostolica ad
Anglicanse ecclesise reconciliationem
in Angliam missi sunt, sed pace
infecta redeuntes nihil afflictis con-
tulerunt.' This enables us to under-
stand the letter of Innocent III. dated
Feb. 27, 1213. in which he tells John
that he has received letters in which
the king promises to perform all that
the abbot of Beaulieu, A. Marcel, and
four other messengers shall undertake
on his behalf. Of these messengers,
however, only three have presented
themselves : ' ii vero tres nuncii nobis
ad ultimum obtulerunt quod secundum
illam forniam satisfucere promittebas
quam per dilectos rilios Pandulfum
subdiaconum et fratrem Durandum
familiares nostros tibi curavimus
destinare. Verum cum per te steterit
quo minus secundum eandem formam
pax fuent reformata, et postea pejora
prioribuB attentaveris, nos ad earn
. . . minime tenemur.' Foedera, i.
108; Ann. Burton, 218; Innoc. Epp.
xv. 234. Of the envoys, the abbot of
Beaulieu, Thomas of Herdington, and
Philip of Worcester had expenses
allowed for their journey, on the llth

WALTEE OF COVENTKY

473

John was obstinate ; the dread of treason, too, failed to subdue him ;
but the prophecy of Peter of Wakefield,1 as the contemporary writers
assert, effected what the successor of the apostle had attempted in
vain. John's submission was as abject as his conduct hitherto had
been wilful ; and he obtained the support of the pope, not merely
to disarm Philip Augustus, or to justify him in hanging Peter of
Wakefield, but to turn it against his own people.

I have stated by anticipation the effect of this struggle on the
English church ; its effect on the relations between England and
the papacy is read in the history of the country from 1213 to this
day. It may be true that John's struggle was in this, as it was in
the other contests of his reign, the logical conclusion of a series of
events that must have had some conclusion of the kind, that he
really bore the brunt of the battle which the policy of the Norman
sovereigns had necessitated ; but it is not the less true that he
provoked the crisis which they had contrived to avert, at a moment
the most unfavourable for himself, and that he fought it with
weapons which they would have scorned ; and thus, although the
result was to the ultimate benefit of England, it was to the immediate
humiliation of the sovereign and to the permanent embittering of
every element in the complication.

The pacification with the pope was arranged in May 1213, and
measures were forthwith taken for the satisfaction of the pecuniary
claims of the clergy and the relaxation of the interdict. The
negotiations lasted more than a year, and have a constitutional
importance of their own on which we cannot enter in detail. The

He gives
in at last

Important
consequences
of John's
submission

The result
was immi-
nent, but was
precipitated
by John

Measures
taken, after
the pacifica-
tion with
the pope, to
insure good
government

of November 1212. Eot. Glaus, i. 126.
The others were W. de S. Audoeno
and Eichard de Merton. The pope
thus declares that the mission of
Pandulf and Durand had failed, and
that severer measures had been taken
against the king in consequence.
These can scarcely have been other
than the absolution of his subjects
from their allegiance, and the direction
to Philip to depose John : W. Cov. ii.
209; Wendover, 241. Possibly these
commands were given in the letter
' exspectantes hactenus exspectavi-
mus,' all copies of which were ordered,
after the homage done to Nicolas of
Tasculum, to be destroyed (Epp. xvi.
133). Dr. Pauli rejects the earlier
mission of Pandulf and Durand, iii.
365, 374. But the authority of our
chronicle is very strong ; and it is
confirmed by the Annals of Tewkes-
bury under the year 1211 : ' Nuncii

domini papte venerunt Angliam prop-
ter pacem ecclesia?, sed infecto negotio
redierunt,' p. 60 : and those of Margam
mention the discussion at Northamp-
ton, p. 31 ; also Ann. Wikes and
Oseney, p. 55 ; M. Paris, 230 ; Ann.
Winton. p. 81. But I fear the details
are too graphic to be true, especially
the story of Pandulf going out of the
council to look for a candle to excom-
municate the king, whereon John
forthwith yielded his point. Ann.
Burton, 217.

1 Walt. Cov. ii. 208 ; Ann. Margam,
p. 60 ; Wendover gives four reasons
for his submission : his long excom-
munication; his fear of Philip; his
apprehension of treason ; and ' quar-
tam vero causam aliis plus omnibus
timebat,' namely, the approach of the
day of the fulfilment of Peter's
prophecy. Wendover, iii. 248; M.
Paris, 235.

474

THE HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS OF

Production
of the
charter of
Henry I.

John quar-
rels with
the barons

QwCrn

Pits Peter ;
one of the
legal barons

king, on the occasion of the absolution in July,1 renewed his
coronation oath with additional promises of good government. In
August an assembly was held at S. A Hum's under the justiciar
Geoffrey Fitz Peter, in which those promises were fully stated, and
directions for their fulfilment were laid on the sheriffs ; * and the
same month Archbishop Langton at 8. Paul's laid the charter
of Henry I. before the clergy,3 as affording a programme upon the
lines of which the king's reforms should be undertaken. Unfortu-
nately for John, on the 2nd of October the justiciar died, and from
that moment he seems to have either lost or deliberately cast away
the hold which he had until then retained on the baronage. 4

We know too little of Geoffrey Fitz Peter to allow us to describe
him as a model or as a representative minister. The few notices
preserved of his personal character lead us to regard him rather as a
vigilant and astute man of business than as a statesman or a patriot.
His origin is somewhat uncertain ; he was, however, probably one of
those obscure persons whose fortune was made by Henry II. and
Richard I. through the marriage of heiresses. He had obtained the
hand of one of the co-heiresses of William de Mandeville, and in her
right the succession to the earldom of Essex. In the following out
of this claim he had shown a grasping and litigious spirit which
may or may not have been brought out by a legal education ; * and

' July 20. M. Paris, 239.

* August 4, Weudover, iii. 261 ;
M. Paris, 239 : where in an assembly
of the magnates, attended by the
archbishop and bishops and the reeve
and four men out of each of the king's
demesne townships, it was ordered
' quatenus leges Henrici avi sui ab
omnibus in regno custodirentur.'
What those laws were does not seem
to have been ascertained until the
25th of the same month, when the
archbishop produced the charter of
Henry I.

» August 25. M. Paris, 240;
Wendover, iii. 263.

4 The words of Matthew Paris are
so remarkable that I give the passage
entire : ' Anno vero sub eodem Gau-
fridus filius Petri totius Angliea justi-
tiariuH. vir magnae potestatis etauctori-
tatis, in maximum regni detrimentum
diem clausit extremum. secunda die
Octobris. Knit autem nrmissiraa
regni columna, utpote vir generosus,
legum peritus, thesauris reditibus et
omnibus bonis instaurutus, omnibus
Anglire magnatibus sanguine vel
amicitia confcederatus. Unde rex

ipsum praa omnibus mortalibus sine
dilectione formidabat ; ipse enim lora
regni gubernabat. Unde post ejus
obitum facta est Anglia quasi in tem-
pestate navis sine gubernaculo. Cujus
tempestatis initiuin fuit mors Huberti
Cantuariensis archiepiscopi, viri mag-
nifici et fidelis : nee post mortem
istorum duorum potuit Anglia respi-
rare. Cum dicti Petri mors regi
Johanni nuncinretur, cachinnando
dixit, " Cum venerit in infernum
salutet Hubertum Cantuariensem
archiepiscopum, quern procul dubio
ibi inveniet." Et conversus ad cir-
cumsedentes subintulit dicens, " Per
pedes Domini, nunc primo sum rex et
dominus Anglise." Habuit igitur ex
tune potestatem liberiorem, juramentia
suis et pactis qua cum ipso Oaufrido
dolente fecerat contraire, et inihu pacis
vinculis quibus se involverat denodare.
1'u'iiituit igitur ipsum graviter et
amarissime quod ad predict® pacie
consensum inclinaretur.' M. Paris,
243.

4 See Hoveden, above, p. 222. Mon.
Angl. iv. 145.

WALTEE OF COVENTRY 475

it is far from improbable that he suggested some of the captious

and pettifogging exactions of John. He had been in the Exchequer Career of

TT i • • • e xu • i- • u- J Geoffrey

under Henry II. ; l in the commission of the ]usticiarsmp under FHZ Peter
Richard I.,2 and was made by him chief justiciar on the archbishop's
resignation in July 1198.3 With the exception of a campaign
against the Welsh in the same year, 4 his exploits seem to have been
achieved rather in the council than in the field ; and his financial
policy is marked by the increased stringency of the exactions under
the forest law, and the severe measures against the regular clergy
which were taken directly after his appointment ; 5 the augmentation
of the carucage at the beginning of John's reign may also have been
suggested by him, for it was a measure unlikely to recommend itself
to a newly-crowned king as either popular or necessary.6 Besides
these slight and early indications, there is quite enough in the
history of the reign to show that Geoffrey was neither a scrupulous
minister nor a man of rigid principles, religious or political. He He had been
seems not to have hesitated to carry out the king's orders against Liuiste",
the clergy, nor to have interposed to alleviate the severe measures of acted^s a
precaution which John took against the suspected barons. Com- Caster"1 Ws
paratively free from class influences, and yet closely connected with
the nobles, he was able with a very little holding back to make
himself necessary to his master. As John Gray and Peter des
Roches served his purposes in the church, Geoffrey had with less
guilt and less responsibility served him with the baronage ; his great
fault being that he served him too well. But although Geoffrey,
like Hubert Walter, had been willing no doubt to strain the law to
its full extent and to take the fullest reasonable responsibility for the
measures of the government, he could not forget that he was a
baron and a lawyer, and the necessity of being served by him had
been irksome to John. Untaught by the lessons of the last eight John's joy
years to feel either gratitude or respect, John, on hearing of the oThirdeafh.
death of the justiciar, scoffingly observed that when he got to hell
he would meet Hubert Walter there and might carry him his
greetings. Then, turning to his courtiers, he said, ' By the feet
of God, now for the first time am I king and lord of England ' ;
words which, spoken of Henry I. in reference to the banishment of
Robert of Belesme, have so different a meaning.7 With Henry the
joy was felt for the riddance of a tyrant who was persecuting alike

1 He was one of the forest justices Wales in 1209, but no fighting, p. 32.
in the 31st of Henry II. Madox, Hist. 5 Hoveden, above, p. 302.

Exch. p. 380. " See Hoveden, ibid.

2 Hoveden, iii. 16, 28, 96. 7 Ord. Vit. XI. iii. ' Omnis Anglia,

3 Hoveden, iv. 48. July ll.Fcedera, exulante crudeli tyranno, exultavit,
i. 71. multorumque congratulatio regi Hen-

4 Hoveden, iv. 53. The Dunstable rico tune adulando dixit, " Gaude, rex
Annals mention an expedition into Henrice, Donainoque Deo gratias age,

476

THE HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS OF

The dcntli of
the jnsticinr
followed by
the breach
between
John and
the barons

The growth
of the
baronial
grievances

Their juris-
dictions
were already
limited

the king and the people ; with John it was for the death of a faithful
servant who stood between him and his destined victims. Matthew
Paris records the story, and adds that 'after his death England
became a ship in a storm without a helm. The beginning of the
tempest was the death of Hubert ; after the death of Geoffrey the
country could not even breathe.' l It is clear that Geoffrey's
influence had had the effect of keeping the king under some sort of
restraint, although what the extent of the restraint may have been
can be gathered only by a calculation of the difference between the
preceding and following acts of tyranny and extortion. John, how-
ever, probably regarded Geoffrey as responsible for the mention
of the laws of Henry I. at S. Alban's, and as having put a most
dangerous weapon in the hands of the barons. Anyhow with
Geoffrey's death the loss of all remaining influence over the barons
does in point of time coincide, and the series of events begins which,
broken in the middle by the extortion of Magna Carta, lasts through-
out the remainder of the reign of John and the early years of his
successor. During these years, had it not been for the support of
the papacy, they must have lost England as John had lost his
continental states before.

The grievances of the barons are not now heard of for the first
time ; but it is the first time that they see it necessary to throw
them into the same scale with those of the church and the nation at
large. It is necessary to look back to the beginning of the reign,
and at the risk of a little repetition to trace the growth of them.
The old feudal gravamina had most probably ceased to be felt : he
would have been a bold man who had refused to admit the royal
justices into his franchise, or claimed to exercise the right of coinage
or high judicature among his own vassals. True, the constable
Roger de Lacy had, in 1198, hanged two of his knights as traitors,
but Roger was on the king's side at the time the act was committed,
when the country was in a state of civil war, and the excite-
ment which, notwithstanding the palliating circumstances, followed
the execution was such as shows it to have been in the highest
degree exceptional.2 But under the system of Henry II. there
were some points which were felt to be abuses, and which the
new nobility as well as the old feudatories, as soon as they had
made good their footing, attempted to reform. Such were the dis-
paragement of heiresses by unequal marriages,3 common under both

quia tu libere ccepisti regnare, ex quo
Bodbertum de Belismo vicisti, et de
finibus regni tui expulisti," ' ed. Du-
chesne, 808.

1 M. Paris, p. 243, quoted in note to
p. 474.

* Benedict, ii. 232, 233 ; Hoveden,
iii. 172.

1 Ralph Niger, p. 169 : ' Filias
miserae conditionis corruptas et op-
pressas copulans clarissiinis, hseredes
oinrics mechanicos creavit. Servis

WALTER OF COVENTRY 477

Kichard and his father ; the continued retention of the castles of the The dis-

earls who had ceased to be formidable ; the postponement of the and' deteu-

investiture of heirs by the exaction of enormous reliefs, or the estates

wanton detention of their estates irrespective of the reliefs : the Great ex-

actions,

whole traffic in wardship and marriage ; all these have their exact wardship,
analogies in ecclesiastical affairs, from which the abuses had been ri'a'ge™
probably borrowed ; the constant occupation of the estates of the
prelates and monasteries by the king's officers, and the prolonging
of vacancies of sees that the revenue might run into the Exchequer.

It seems to have fallen to the lot of the great earls to act as Discontent
spokesmen of the baronage on these and the like heads. It was by wriaatthe
a promise that the king would redress their grievances that Hubert thlrei^a8 Ol
Walter obtained their adhesion to the cause of John and their con-
sent to his succession ; l and in 1201, when their services were
demanded for the war in Normandy, they met at Leicester and
refused to follow the king unless their rights were restored to them.2
They had then been summarily and peremptorily silenced.

But to these grievances John's own reign had added the increase New griov-
of taxation to a degree before unimagined, and the exaction by way the ™ie
of fines of sums arbitrarily demanded, assessed, and enforced ; and
the question of foreign service entered into and complicated most of
the other questions of taxation and finance. It is unfortunate that
we are only able to account by way of inference for the present state
of this question. The obligation of the royal vassals to serve in obligation
foreign warfare did not and could not come into dispute so long as service18"
those vassals owed allegiance to the sovereign as duke of Normandy
and Aquitaine. And in the earlier Norman reigns, under William
Rufus at least, there is some evidence to show that the obligation
was regarded, or construed, as binding not on the vassals only, but
on the national militia, the old fyrd of the Anglo-Saxon times. Al- HOW the
though that force had never been actually taken across the Channel, to foreign
it had been brought down to Hastings for the purpose, and had |£owu up
there been dismissed, on surrendering its travelling money for the
king's necessities.3 In the war of Toulouse, the first war waged by
him as duke of Aquitaine, Henry II. had come upon all the English
baronage ; and the application of the rule of scutage for the purpose
of that war,1 both to the bishops, who could have no foreign fiefs,
and to the entire body of the knights, who in most instances were

generosas copulans pedaneae condi- 2 Hoveden, iv. 161 : ' ex communi

tionis fecit universes. Haereditates consilio mandaverunt regi quod non

retinuit aut vendidit.' This is of transfretarent cum illo nisi ille

course rhetorical, but the grievance reddiderit eis jura sua.'

was real. See Benedict, ii. 71, 72. :l Floren. Wig. ad ann. 1094.

1 Hoveden, iv. 88 : ' redderet 4 Ben. Pet. above, pp. 150-152.
unicuique illorum jus suum.'

478

THE HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS OF

So n ta(?*

Refusal of
a grant to
Richard

Result of
the military
policy of
Henry II.

exclusively English, would show that in 1158 no legal difference
was made between service on the continent and service in Britain,
in all parts of which, Scotland, Galloway, Wales, and perhaps in
Ireland also, it was rendered or accounted for without hesitation.
Still the introduction of the scutage for the first Aquitanian war
may be interpreted as implying a misgiving as to the right of de-
manding service from the English in a land where they had no fiefs.
In 1177 Henry II. summoned to Portsmouth all the tenants of the
Crown in arms for the invasion of France : l the purpose was not
carried out, in consequence of the peace negotiations opened with
Lewis VII., but the summons was obeyed, the earls, barons, and
knights crossed the Channel, and there is no record of any show of
reluctance on the part of the feudatories. The reign of Richard
does not afford any evidence of such occasion having arisen until
1198. A scutage was raised for war in Normandy in 1195,2 but
three years after, when the justiciar proposed in the great council
that a grant should be made for the maintenance of 800 knights for
war in France, the bishops of Lincoln and Salisbury declared that
their estates were held on a tenure of military service within the
borders of England, and there only.3

It would appear, then, that the present phase of the question had
been thus produced. In the first place Henry II. had introduced
great reforms into the military and financial administration, re-
creating for internal defence the national militia, which could not be
expected to serve abroad, and using for foreign warfare an army of
stipendiaries whom he did not bring to England, but whom he paid
by funds raised by scutage from the whole landed interest of the
country.4 The vassals had thus got into the way of leaving the
king to manage his foreign wars in his own fashion : the few who
went with him to France either had French interests to maintain or
received from him pay for their men if not for themselves. In the
second place, the number of vassals who held land on both sides of
the Channel was diminished, many of the Norman families having
already broken up into two branches, a French one and an English
one, while the new nobility of Henry II. either had, as a rule, a very
small stake in Normandy compared with their possessions at home,
or else possessed no Norman estates at all.5 It cannot be pretended

1 Benedict, i. 160, 167, 168, 190.

* See Hoveden, above, p. 297. Bed
Book of the Exchequer (ap. Hunter,
Three Catalogues, p. 15) ; Madox,
Hist. Exch. 444.

1 Hoveden, iv. 40; Magna Vita 8.
Hugonis, p. 248 Hoveden, above, p.
99

1 Dialogue de Scaccario, i. 9.

•' The passage of the canon of
Barnwell, preserved by Walter of
Coventry, ii. 217, is of the grortart
importance on this point; the
northern barons insist that they owe
no service abroad, or scutage for
foreign service. John replies that he

WALTER OF COVENTRY

479

that the law spoke very distinctly on the subject of obligatory ser-
vice, for it is clear that it was unsettled in the reign of Edward I.,
when the recalcitrant earls Bohun and Bigod raised the same cry as
had been so potent under their predecessors in 1214.

Another of the new grievances was the increase in direct taxation
which had been demanded immediately upon the king's accession.
The rate of carucage was then raised from two to three shillings,1
and that of scutage from twenty shillings to two marks, and the
latter impost was levied for six years in succession. In 1208 a
seventh of movables was exacted from the baronage ; 2 in 1204 an
aid was taken from all the knightly landholders of the country ; 3 in
1207 a thirteenth of movables,4 the amount of which may be
estimated by the fact that in 1224, when the country was much
more impoverished than it was in 1207, a fifteenth so raised
amounted to nearly 60,OOOZ.5 Besides these general taxes enormous
sums were exacted from individuals, especially the Jews,6 and the
persons on whom John could bring his legal chicanery to bear, by
the system of fines which was elaborated under his directions into
that minute and grotesque instrument of torture which all the
historians of the reign have dwelt on in great detail. It is further
to be observed that much of this money was raised unconstitution-
ally ; the taxation imposed, not with the silent or sulky acquiescence
of the council, but in opposition to the protest of the barons.
Archbishop Geoffrey of York, an unfortunate person to be chosen as

has a right to it, for it was done in
the days of his father and brother.
John was right as to the fact ; the
barons as clearly had the reason of
the thing on their side. Compare R.
Coggeshall, p. 243.

1 ' Exiit ergo edictum a justitiariis
regis per universam Angliarn ut
quselibet caruca arans tres persolveret
solidos : quse nimirum gravis exactio
valde populum terras extenuavit, cum
antea gravis exactio scutagii prseces-
sisset; nam ad scutum dues marcse
persolvebantur, cum nunquam am-
plius quam viginti solidi ad scutum
exigerentur.' R. Coggeshall, ed. Dun-
kin, p. 180; Ann. Winton. 73; M.
Paris, 200. The scutages of John's
reign are thus enumerated in the Red
Book of the Exchequer (apud Hunter,
p. 15) : ' A°. 1. primum scutagium
post coronationem regis ; on each fee
two marks ; 3°, 4°, 5°, 6°, 7°, 8° ; six
assessments of two marks each, pro
exercitu Normannise ; 12°, pro pas-
sagio regis in Hibcrniam, on each fee
two marks ; 13°, pro exercitu WallitE,

Indistinct-
ness of the
state of the
law

Increase of
direct taxa-
tion

Irregular
exactions

System of
fines

Money
raised in
spite of re-
fusal of the
payers

on each fee two marks ; eodem, pro
exercitu Scotise, on each fee two
marks.' Notwithstanding the great
authority for this statement, it is im-
possible not to suspect that some of
the scutages were merely arrears of
past years. The scutage of Wales in
1211 is mentioned by M. Paris, 230.

2 Matt. Paris, p. 209.

3 Two marks and a half. M. Paris,
p. 209.

4 Ann. Waverley, 258 ; M. Paris,
221 ; Rot. Pat. i. 72.

5 Liber Ruber (ap. Hunter, p. 22) :
' Summa xvmffl assisse per Angliam
anno regni regis Henrici filii regis
Johannis octavo, 86, 758 marc, et 2 d.'

6 From the Jews in 1209 he raised
66,000 marks ; and from the Cister-
cians the next year 33,333 marks,
Liber de Ant. Legg. p. 201. M. Paris
states the latter sum as 40,000 pounds,
p. 230 ; and adds to it 100,000 pounds
obtained the same year from the
regular clergy. Cf. W. Covent. ii.
200, 201, 202.

480

THE HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS OF

The clergy
put forward
n» objectors

John's
meanness
and tyranny
more In-
tolerable
than hU
exactions

His treat-
ment of the
barons when
prepared for
foreign ser-
vice

a champion of law, provoked an attack on himself as early as 1200
by his opposition to the carucage,1 and in 1207 the thirteenth was
exacted although the clergy had absolutely refused to grant it,2 and
Geoffrey went into exile in consequence.3 On these occasions,
although the clergy are put forward as the objectors, it is not on
ecclesiastical grounds that they oppose : the taxes were no more
popular with the baronage, but the bishops were personally safe from
the ungovernable savagery of the king ; being protected from
corporal harm and having no children to seize as hostages, they
could speak with comparative boldness, where a temporal baron
would have had to take his choice between civil war, imprisonment,
and forfeiture.

What, however, was far more galling to a proud and not illiberal
body of men like the barons, whom Henry had trained to government
and Richard to perfect skill in warfare, was the fact that the money
extorted and the service demanded from them were extorted and
demanded on false pretences ; whilst any attempt at remonstrance on
their part was met by the exercise of irresponsible tyranny. The
taxes were raised for the defence of the country and the recovery of
his inheritance,4 yet John made no real attempt to recover Normandy,
and England was not yet assailed. The forces summoned to Ports-
mouth in 1201 were allowed to return home on a payment of money
to the king ; 5 in 1202 and 1208, having reached Normandy, they
found the king indisposed to fight and left him in disgust, for which
on his return he forced them to atone by the infliction of enormous
fines.6 In 1205 he assembled another great army and fleet at Ports-
mouth, and there made a feigned start for France. He sailed from

1 Hoveden, iv. 140.

2 Ann. Waverley, p. 258.

3 M. Paris, p. 221 ; Ann. Margam,
p. 28 ; Ann. Wiporn. 395 ; Ann. Win-
ton. 79 ; Ann. Waverl. 258, 259 ; Walt.
Cov. ii. 198, 199. The northern pri-
mate was engaged in this his last
struggle with his brother just at the
same time that the negotiations on
the interdict were going on ; and the
quarrel is much less known. On the
18th December 1207, the pope wrote
to the bishops of Worcester, Ely, and
Hereford to urge John to make
amends to the archbishop for his
extortions, under pain of interdict
(Epp. x. 172) ; and on the 27th of May,
1208, he wrote to the bishops of
London and Rochester and the dean
of Lincoln, telling the whole story;
John had exacted a thirteenth from
the religious and the clergy of the

province of York, contrary to the
liberty of the church : Geoffrey had
left England to appeal to the pope,
and John had immediately seized all
his temporalities, although the pope
had written six months before to the
bishops of Ely, Worcester, and Here-
ford without result: the recipients
are to admonish the king, and if that
fails, after three months, to put the
province under interdict : Epp. xi. 87.
In 1210, May 6. the pope was still
writing on the thirteenth to Geoffrey:
Epp. xiii. 67.

4 ' Ad recuperandam heareditatem
suam in Normannia et in aliis terris
suis,' Ann. Wav. 258. Of the thir-
teenth, W. Cov. ii. 198.

* Hoveden, iv. 163. Two marks
on the knight's fee, M. Paris, 206.

• M. Paris, p. 200.

WALTEE OF COVENTRY 481

Portsmouth and landed at Wareham ; as soon as he returned to
Portsmouth he dismissed his forces and took a pecuniary grant
instead of service.1 On this occasion the historians tell us that Arch-
bishop Hubert dissuaded the king from the expedition, and that the
barons were offended and disgusted at the final resolution taken after
the labour and expense had been incurred.2 But if this were really
done, we can only suppose that the archbishop made, as he had often
done before, a sacrifice of his own dignity to save the character of
the king, or, if his appeal were bona fide, that he in common with
the baronage 3 mistrusted John's capacity and used his influence to
prevent unnecessary sacrifice. The barons, too, may well have been
disinclined to follow John, and yet irritated by the facile way in
which after all their exertions they were thrown over. But more
than irritation at this moment they could not show, for they saw
themselves in his power. Any sign of resistance he met by demand- Joim-s
ing their children as hostages.4 So fortified against the men who siien^g °
would have been bis surest defence, he filled his treasury witk-the opposl
spoils of his subjects, and, letting go all that he had inherited of
territory and honour, consoled himself with his money-bags, his
vicious indulgences, and his petty acts of spite and vengeance. And
the mingled shame and malignity of this policy wrought its effects
in the long run, although it was not until the great church struggle
was over that the long endurance of evil united all parties against
the tyrant.

The beneficial provisions of the great charter were not confined Grievances
to the clergy and the baronage. There was a third estate with commons
distinct interests, and trained under the system of Henry II. for a
distinct future of its own. The hardships of the commons were one
set of grievances that called for remedy, and the co-operation of
the commons was needed if a remedy were to be possible. The
people, alienated by the sufferings which, in common with the clergy,
they had endured under the interdict, and, in common with the

1 M. Paris, p. 212 ; K. Coggeshall alii vero nepotes et carnaliter propin-

(ed. Dunkin), p. 227. quos nunciis tradebant,' Wendover,

- E. Coggeshall, p. 228. iii. 224, 225 ; M. Paris, 227. ' Erant

3 The Earl Marshall is mentioned insuper hac tempestate multi nobiles
as joining in the appeal of the arch- in regno Anglise, quorum rex uxores
bishop : E. Coggeshall, p. 227 ; all the et filias illis murmurantibus oppresse-
optimates, by the Annals of Margam, rat ; alii quos indebitis exactionibus
p. 28 ; Ann. Waverl. 256 ; M. Paris, ad extremam inopiam perduxerat ;
p. 212 ; Wendover, iii. 182. nonnulli quorum parentes et carnales

4 In 1201 William of Albini saved amicos exulaverat, eorum haereditates
his castle of Belvoir by giving his son in suos usus convertens ; unde factum
as hostage: Hoveden, iv. 161. In 1208, est ut idem rex tot fere habuit hostes
when John demanded hostages, in fear quot habuit magnates.' M. Paris, p.
of the pope's absolving the barons 232 ; Wendover, iii. 240.

from their oaths of fealty, ' alii filios,

r i

•ls-2

THE HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS OF

Altered

attitude of
the crown

and com-
mon*

Special pro-
vi-ions of
the Great
Charter in
favour of the
oommona

baronage, during the abeyance of justice, were willing and able to
assert their rights, and for the first time since the Conquest ranged
themselves on the side of the barons against the king. The text of
Magna Carta shows what their grievances were. As the king had
treated the barons of the opposite party, he had allowed the barons
of his own party to treat the people : what little support he had he
bad purchased by allowing his favourites the full sway of feudal
tyranny.1 The royal exactions by which all alike suffered were
reproduced in the baronial taxation, by which the commons in
particular suffered over and above the rest. Under one or the other
of these two principles almost all the gravamina of the commons
came, for the incidence of feudal hardships was uniform, and of
course the accumulation pressed most heavily on the lowest rank.
Hence the force and propriety of the clauses by which the barons
insist that the king shall secure for their vassals as regards them
the same liberties that they obtained for themselves.8 It was not
enough that the status of the commons should depend on the mere
benevolence of the great feudatories, who might at any moment
purchase from the Crown the liberty of tyrannising : the barons of
Runnymede guard the people against themselves as well as against
the common tyrant. The provision which Henry I. forced on the
nobles on behalf of the people 3 is now forced by the nobles upon
the king, in order to make it impossible for the future that class
should be set against class.

But besides these, a great number of the articles of the charter
have a meaning only when viewed in relation to the rights of the
commons. The provision for the city of London is made applicable
to all the towns of the country ; 4 the freeholders' interests are
everywhere coupled with those of the knights and the barons ; ft the
ancient courts of the nation in which the barons have little or no
direct share are restored to full efficiency ; 6 the stock in trade of
the merchant, the land qualification of the freeholder, and the
wainage of the villein are preserved from over-amercement, as well
as the settled estate of earldom or barony.7 If the knight is freed
from compulsory exaction of service, the freeholder is freed from

1 It is to this that the 15th article
of the charter refers, ' Nos non con-
cedemus de cetero alicui quod capiat
aaxilium,' &c.

2 Art. Baronum, 48 ; Magna Carta,
art. 60. ' Omnes autem istas consue-
tudines et libertates quas rex concessit
regno tenendas quantum ad Be per-
tinet erga suos, omnes de regno tarn
clerici quam laici observabunt quan-
tum ad se pertinet erga suos.' Com-
pare M. C. art. 15.

1 M. Carta Henrici I. art. 2 : ' Simi-
liter et homines baronum meorum
justa et legitima relevatione releva
bunt terras suas de dominis suis.'
Art. 4 : ' Et praecipio quod barones
mei similiter se contineant erga tilios
et nlias vel uxores hominum suoruin.'

« Magna Carta, Art. IS.

• Articles 14 and 15.

• Articles 17, 18, 19, 24, 25, 38, 45.
7 Articles 20, 21, 22, 23.

WALTER OF COVENTRY 483

compulsory cartage.1 If it is to the freeholder of land chiefly that
the boon is given, it must be remembered that it was in and through
the holding of land that a man became obnoxious to the demands
that are now restricted. The non-landholding free man was protected
by his own status ; he had nothing on which feudal tyranny could
prey directly ; nor could the feudal interest obtain for itself a
remission of taxation which would not be directly applicable to all
the population. Hence it is, no doubt, that there is so little notice
of villeins in the charter ; it was not that they had no spokesman,
but that they were free from the more pressing grievances and
benefited by every general provision. The provisions for equal
justice are applicable to the commons as to the baronage ; the relief
from forest tyranny is a boon to all classes alike.2 Clause for clause
the rights of the freeholders are stated with the rights of the barons,
and analogous remedies are provided wherever one rule seems
inapplicable to both.

It may very naturally be asked, how came this accord to be Amount of
effected ; was there a treaty made by the barons with the commons between the
previous to the drawing up of the articles by the barons to be the°coma-nd
presented to the king, or were the demands of the barons for the mons
people the mere outcome of a political stratagem for isolating the
public enemy ? Bead, I think, by the light of the preceding history,
the circumstances scarcely allow of either supposition. No doubt
when the assembly of the commons of the royal demesne met the
bishops and barons under Geoffrey Fitz Peter at S. Alban's,3 the
three estates learned much of each other's desires ; and we cannot
question that when Langton at S. Paul's expounded to the clergy the
great charter of Henry I.4 he pointed out the duty there enforced,
that they should do to their vassals as they would have the king do
to them. But the accord lay deeper than this ; in fact they could
not have entered at all into each other's views if it had not been for
the feeling that the English were now become one people, and that
the benefits of institutions rapidly becoming spontaneous, instinctive,
and free, were making that unity a fact too certain to be contro-
verted, too prominent to be ignored. If we run through the list of The North-
the barons who took the leading part in resisting John and in IStutiouaT
drawing up the charter, we shall see that although it may contain *****
the names of a few who were moved by personal feelings, or by the
old leaven of feudal opposition, the great majority are men of
English interests, sprung from the English patriots of 1173, the
Northern barons 5 who had saved the country in that year, and

1 Articles 29 and 30. 5 ' Barones Northumbriae,' R. Cog-

2 Articles 44-48. geshall, p. 246. ' Contradixerunt ex
8 M. Paris, 239. * M. Paris, 240. Aquilonaribus nonnulli, illi videlicet

ll 2

484

THE HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS OF

Other ele-
ment* of
hostility to
the king

Importance
of Mainui
Carta

Part taken
by the com-
mons hi
securing it ;
the barons
acting as
leaders

who refused to follow John to Poictou in 1218. True, John had
united every sort of hostility against himself : there is Geoffrey de
Mandeville, the son of Geoffrey Fitz Peter and husband of the king's
divorced wife ; l Giles de Braiose, bishop of Hereford, who had the
cruel wrongs of his family to avenge ; there is the earl of Clare, who
from the beginning of the reign had maintained an attitude of
suspicion ; Bigod and Mowbray and Aumale, the hereditary repre-
sentatives of feudal insubordination ; 2 but they are a small element
by the side of the Northern barons, who had never been ranged
against the king before,3 the loyal Lacies, the Percies, the Vescies,
the Bohuns, the Stutevilles, the Veres, the Vauxes, and the Multons ;
the men who sprang from the chosen servants of Henry II. and his
most valued ministers, whose descendants were the strength of that
great Lancastrian party which maintained the spirit of freedom
in the darkest days of the fourteenth century ; the barons who in-
variably led and were followed by the commons.

Magna Carta is, then, the first corporate act of the nation roused
to the sense of its unity; the first act of the three estates dis-
covering the true oneness of their interests and sinking their
differences under the pressure of the common enemy. That the
historians have recorded less of the action of the third estate is
accounted for by the fact that at this period and from this period to
the Reformation the baronage acts as advocate for it ; and there is
as yet no division between the town and country parties. But the
barons could not have done what they did without the help of the
people, and the king would not have been so helpless as he was if
he could, as William Rufus and Henry I. had done, have made
himself strong in the support of the people against the barons. The
effect of his fifteen years of misrule had been to undo all that had
been done to strengthen the royal power since the reign of Henry I. ;
to undo the work of the twelfth century in England, as he had done
in the continental territories of his house ; and thus to set the

qui anno prmterito regem ne in Picta-
viam transiret impedierunt ; dicentes
se propter terras quas in Anglia tenent
non debere regem extra regnum sequi
nee ipsum euntem scutagio juvare ' :
Walt. Cov. ii. 217. The canon of
Barnwell, indeed, generally speaks of
them as the Northern party, ii. 219,
221 ; Transhumbrani, p. 222 ; the
Annals of Dunstable call them
Norenses, pp. 40, 43 ; ' licet f uissent de
diversis partibus Angliee, tamen oinnes
fuerunt vocati Norenses,' Lib. de Ant.
Legg. p. 201.

1 W. Covent. ii. 225; Ann. Dunst.

45. John, it is said, had made him
marry her. She married after his
death Hubert de Burgh.

* W. Covent. ii. 225.

3 ' Aquilonaribus supradictis et
pluribus aliis quos longum esset enu-
merare,' Walt. Cov. ii. 219 ; M. Paris,
p. 254. The Vescies, the Stutevilles, the
Vauxes, the Lacies, the lords of Kyme
and Lanvalei, were of Northern houses
risen by the service of Henry II. : the
Percies and the Bruces were Northern
barons less closely connected with
official life. The list will bear the
severest analysis.

WALTER OF COVENTRY

nation at one with itself, in a way in which it had not since the
Conquest realised its identity. The sentence of Eunnymede reversed
the sentence of Hastings.

That John saw what he was doing it would be rash to affirm : it The king
cannot be said that even Innocent III. fully realised the position of
affairs ; l but both showed an instinctive hostility to the claims of the
nation which forms a clue to the later history. John attempted to
divide his enemies before as well as after the concession. Now he
would grant the liberties of the church if the clergy would detach J°h" f>es
themselves from the cause of the barons.2 Now he would treat with and fails
the barons in the idea of escaping from their constitutional demands
by purchasing their adhesion with the gift of feudal privileges.3 Now
he would disarm all hostility by declaring himself a crusader, and
involving all opponents in the excommunication resulting from his
sacrosanctity.4 But he failed in each plan, and the bloodless issue
of the contest proves, if there were need of proof, the unity of the
nation and the isolation of the king. Nor has he the credit of
accepting the terms forced upon him with the intention of observing
them. When he seals the charter he is demanding absolution from
his undertaking,5 and as soon as he has concluded the reconciliation
he sets to work to destroy those whom for that moment he might
have made friends. Nor do they trust him any more than he
deserves. Already perhaps they saw that they had obtained in word The benefits
more than they could secure in reality. The history of the century ter only

shows that it was so ; the very men who had won the constitutional

articles of the charter were, when the supreme power fell into their first

own hands, unable or unwilling to ratify them ; and it was only

after eighty years of striving that they became permanently a part

of the law, in the hand of a king who knew how to keep faith, and Edward the

, 1 I- v.1 J Ml. • • • IT. Iv. £ First really

who saw in a clearer light and with a juster precision the truth of secures
the national unity. The unity which the barons at Runnymede
had realised as against the king, Edward, not without a struggle,
but, when the struggle was over, with a firm faith and righteous
purpose, crowned by the adhesion of royalty itself.

1 John's idea of the pope is thus Feed. i. 128.

interpreted by Matthew Paris: 'No- 4 March 4, 1215, Ann. Theokesb.

verat autem et multiplici didicerat p. 61 ; W. Cov. ii. 219. ' Sinistre hoc

experientia, quod papa super omnes interpretabantur alii, dicentes eum

mortales ambitiosus erat et superbus, non intuitu pietatis aut amore Christi

pecuniseque sititor insatiabilis, et ad hoc fecisse, sed ut eos a proposito

omnia scelera pro prsBmiis datis vel fraudaret.'

promissis cereuset proclivus' (p. 245). 5 'Dum hsec agerentur,' Ann. Dun-

2 On the 21st Nov. 1214, and again stapl. p. 43 ; and see at greater length
on Jan. 25, 1215. See Blackstone's the statement of tha canon of Barn-
remarks, Charters, Introduction, p. x. well ; W. Cov. ii. 222.

3 See his letter of May 10, 1215,

486

THE HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS OF

Conduct of
the papacy

important
retail at
HM ;•<>;"•'-
kdaatfan

Importai -e
of the action
of Edward I.
In this view

Innocent
in. would
scarcely
bare acted
M hiB suc-
cessors di !

But he
would have
been obliged
to yield to
circum-
Btances

The popes now had the choice between the people and the king,
and threw in their lot with the latter in a way that affects the
history of England to the present moment. Had they chosen to
support the barons against the Crown, the complications of the
reign of Henry III. would have been avoided, but then Henry III.
would never have reigned, and England might, after all her early
glories and later discipline, have shared the fate of France. Thus
much the papal alliance did for John : it saved the throne for his
son, and saved the son's throne in the evil days in which the
constitutional struggle was renewed. But when Edward I. found
himself in the position in which he chose to conquer by yielding,
he cast to the winds the compact in which his father and grand-
father had sought their strength. The papal alliance had maintained
the Plantagenet hold on England, but it had almost destroyed its
hold on the English. Edward, too, had to choose between the continu-
ance of his vassalage and his glorious status as a national king. Unlike
John, he chose the latter, to the enormous increase of his own power
in church and state, and to that adjustment of the relations between
the papacy and England which continued to the Reformation, and
which, read politically, without reference to the spiritual questions,
continue in the direction of their course to the present day. The
statutes of Praemunire and Provisors, the principle of which was,
politically speaking, the germ of the Reformation, followed naturally
from the determination of 1297. The Bull Clericis Laicos stands to
the Confirmation of Charters in the same relation as the submission
of Dover stands to the Great Charter itself. The first dissolved the
concordat which was established by Pandulf, the second crowned the
work that was made feasible at Runnymede.

Innocent III. had no successor even second to himself. He
would not, like Honorius III., have attempted the ignoble policy of
supporting the foreign malcontents against the patriotic ministers
of Henry III. He would not have descended to the sordid con-
trivances, or allowed himself to be forced into the self-defeating
arbitrary impotence, of Gregory IX. He would not have broken the
heart and spirit of S. Edmund, or connived at the faithless tyranny
of Henry III., or the cruelties of Charles of Anjou. Nor would he,
like Boniface VIII. , have precipitated a crisis that threw the papacy
into exile, and opened the way to the general disruption of the
Western Church at the Reformation. But he would not have been
able in all probability to alter the result, or to thwart the policy of
tradition. The high Hildebrandine policy would have sought
realisation by nobler but not more effective devices ; and with regard
to England, only a king like Edward I. was required to undo what
John had done, as well as to complete what he and Innocent
together had failed to prevent.

WALTEK OF COVENTRY 487

For John even in the abject humiliation of his end we have no Joim de-
word of pity as we have had none of sympathy. He has deserved commisera-
none. He has no policy of either aggression or defence. We do t!
not credit him with a deliberate design on the rights of his people,
simply because he never showed the consciousness of any rights
they had, but took his own evil way in contempt of law, and in a
wilful ignoring of dangers he dared not face. He made no plans
and grasped at no opportunities. He was persistent only in petty
spite and greedy of easy vengeance. He staked everything on the
object of the moment and made no effort to avert his ruin until it
was consummated. He looked neither before him nor behind him,
drew as little from experience as he sacrificed to expediency, or
as he utilised the present for the ends of the future. He had not
sufficient regard for virtue to make him play the hypocrite, and lost
even the little defence that such a cloak gives to kings. He had
neither energy, capacity, nor honesty ; he availed himself neither
of the help of those who had common interests, nor of the errors
of those whom he regarded as his enemies. He met honest service
with contempt, and the best advice with the treatment due to
dangerous conspiracy. He is an exception to the class of men who Selfishness
are well hated only in this, that none even pretended to love him. o"'joiui
And as he is without wisdom for himself, he has no care for his
people ; on them, the weaker and more innocent the better, he wreaks
the vengeance, the savage vengeance, that the stronger and less inno-
cent have provoked,1 as if burning villages and slaying peasants was
an enjoyment to be set against defeat in council and disgrace in the
field. And now the heart that was obdurate against the sufferings
of the people, that had been unmoved by the cries of the tortured
as it was inexorable to the prayers of friendship, virtue, and sorrow,
is broken by the loss of his treasure.2 And he who had defied
God by word and deed all his life, sought shelter from the terrors
with which superstition, not conscience, had inspired him, by being
buried in the habit of a monk : a posthumous tribute to religion,
which he had believed only to outrage.3

1 This is a marked feature in John's generally : after setting up the dragon

proceedings both in his French wars standard at Winchester, he rled before

and in the cruel measures he adopted Lewis, and set the city on fire in four

in the last year of his reign : for ex- places : 11. Coggesh. p. 258. Instead of

ample he burnt Tours most wantonly relieving Rochester, ' perambulabat

in 1202 (R. Coggeshall, p. 211) ; and terram et incendiis ac rapinis quse-

Le Mans the same year : compare his cunque potuit consumpsit ' : ib. p. 259.

treatment of Rochester in 1215 (R. - ' Quia res ei minime cesserant ad

Coggeshall, p. 252) ; and the work of votum,' Ann. Wav. 286 ; cf. M. Paris,

his mercenaries in the fens (p. 254) : p. '287.

his ravaging of Axholme in 1216 (Walt. 3 It was Merlin's prophecy: 'inter

Cov. ii. 231), and of Lincolnshire sanctos collocabitur,' Wikes, 59

488

CHRONICLES OF THE REIGNS OF

CHRONICLES OF THE REIGNS OF EDWARD I.
AND EDWARD II. VOL. I.

[THE following Preface to the Annales Londonienses and the Annales
Paiilini, two valuable authorities for the reigns of Edward I. and
Edward II., contains much that is of interest. Attention is called to the
mixture of ecclesiastical and civil matters which characterises the
Annales Londonienses, and to the impressions of London life to be
derived from the Annales Paulini. The author of the latter was present
at Edward II.'s coronation, which he describes with minuteness. He also
gives evidence to prove how divided political feeling was in London in
the year 1321. Bishop Stubbs, after devoting 99 pages of his Preface to
an examination of these two Annals, concludes with a sketch of (1) a
portion of the reign of Edward I. and (2) the reign of Edward II.]

Important
illustrations
of contempo-
rary history

The difficul-
ties of
government
under
Edward I.

The king's
poverty and

RESERVING [for the later portion of this collection] our review of the
more important crises of the reign of Edward II., I will devote the
remaining pages of this introduction to the elucidation, rendered
more easy by the documents accumulated of late years, of two of the
subordinate incidents of a period fraught with great issues to English
liberty. Of these the first will be the final struggle of Edward I.
with Archbishop Winchelsey ; the second, the abortive attempt of the
Lancaster party to wrest the supreme power from Isabella and
Mortimer at the opening of the reign of Edward III.

To the student of the reign of Edward I. every difficulty and
embarrassment under which the king laboured serves to enhance
the greatness of the man who with such drawbacks on his activity
could do so much. There are, of course, emergencies and contingencies
which help to draw out the strong points of the character of a ruler ;
such are the exigencies of national defence, the necessities of political
reconciliation, the reconstruction of shattered institutions. But
Edward's difficulties were of a much more trying, penetrating, and
homely character. He was throughout his reign deeply in debt, and,
in every section of his government, hampered by opposition from the
leading prelates of his time. Personally he was very economical and
truly devout. He inherited from his father a poverty which his own

EDWARD I. AND EDWARD II. 489

obligations, incurred during the Crusade, increased into a lifelong
burden; and he inherited from his father certain ecclesiastical
traditions which he found it indeed more easy to break through
than it was to pay his debts, but which in their results and in com-
bination with his debts have a perceptible influence on the colour of
his reign, his popularity whilst he lived, and the reputation which he
left behind him. Setting aside his treatment of the Scots, which
may, of course, be read in two ways, all the events of the reign which
fall short of the ideal events of such a king's reign are attributable
to these two causes, separately or conjointly. From the very day
of his accession Edward was financially in the hands of the Lombard
bankers ; hence arose, no doubt, the difficulty which he had in Besmts of
managing the city of London ; hence came also the financial mis- pecuniary
chief which followed the banishment of the Jews ; and hence an
accumulation of popular discontent, which showed itself, in the king's
lifetime, by opposition to his mercantile policy, and, after his death,
supplied one of the most efficient means for the overthow of his son.
But more than this : Edward's pecuniary exigencies forced him to
the invention or development of a great system of customs duties, in
the collection of which he had to employ foreign agents, and to
an amount of pecuniary dealings with the see of Eome which
imperilled his independence as a king, and brought him into
collision with the independent ecclesiastical instincts of his people.

It had rarely happened in English history that a strong king coinci-
and a strong primate had ruled together or in anything but rivalry, strong kings
The archbishops of Canterbury, inheriting a very special preponder- prun8ate"g
ance in England from the days of the Heptarchy, had been rather
joint rulers than subjects until the Conquest, and since the Conquest
the relations of the heads in church and state had always been
somewhat strained. William I. and Lanfranc, both foreigners, and
men of high intellect and policy, had worked together ; but since
that time, except where a weak king had strong archbishops or weak
archbishops had a strong king, there had been scant peace between
church and state. Anselm had had to fight against William Eufus
and Henry L, Becket against Henry II., Langton against John. All
these were strong men in their way, but the weak Theobald had
had his struggle with the weak Stephen, and the weak Edmund
with the weaker Henry III. In general it had happened that the
ecclesiastical interest had coincided with the interest of popular
liberty, but sometimes that coincidence had been the result of a
common determination to resist those measures of strong government
which were necessary for national consolidation. So it had been in Edward i.
the great Becket quarrel, and so it was in a less degree and with less bishops "'
calamitous results in the reign of Edward I. Archbishop Winchelsey

490 CHRONICLES OF THE REIGNS OF

was probably the ablest man who had sat at Canterbury since
Langton, and his predecessor Peckham, of whom the same might be
said, had borne part of the burden of the struggle before him.
Peckham, however, although a papal nominee in opposition to the
opposition king's choice, and a bold and independent politician, had never
come into personal antagonism with Edward. He had been obliged
to submit his conciliar proceedings to the king's fiat ; he had been
obliged to withdraw from his aggressive attitude in the publication
of the charters, to acquiesce in an unprecedented amount of
ecclesiastical taxation, and to agree to the limitation of ecclesiastical
acquisitiveness in the statute De religiosis, and of ecclesiastical
jurisdiction in the legislation of the Circumspecte agatis. But with
the single exception of the episode of the charters he had not set
Wincheisey himself up as a secular champion. Winchelsey, on the other hand,
either placed himself at the head of the baronial opposition, or by
playing into the hands of the discontented earls had practically con-
nived at the great humiliations of Edward's career. Although he
was an English priest and an Oxford scholar, and although he
attained the primacy by a free election and with the full agreement
of all the competing parties, who so very seldom could agree on such
a point, he was from the moment of his promotion in opposition.
Personal and Personally he disliked the king's ministerial bishops, one of whom,
motives Walter de Langton, was his political rival and enemy as long as he
lived ; and, although Edward and he must have entertained some
respect for one another, it was never such as reached the measure of
personal friendship. Consecrated in 1294, Winchelsey crossed the
Rubicon in 1296, when, relying on the papal Bull Clericis laicos, he
HLS succes- refused to help the king with money ; in 1297 he leagued with the
a?aein8tenc ' earls in forcing the king to confirm the charters, and in 1801 he
finally cut off all chances of future co-operation by his conduct in
the parliament of Lincoln. In each of these cases his conduct was
capable of an easy defence, and the king's policy was tenable only on
Edward** the ground of bitter necessity, but it is clear that Edward saw in the
archbishop's behaviour more than mere official or political opposi-
tion ; he felt the treatment, which he had not deserved, as personal
insult ; and the great king was unquestionably a good hater. For
the political manoauvre by which, in the Lincoln parliament, he had
been obliged to submit to have his minister impeached and his own
honour doubted, he never forgave the archbishop. But for a time
both parties had to deal with a pope who was difficult to manage.
move^ethey Boniface VIII., with all his faults, was incapable of becoming a
pope against political tool, and he was quite capable on occasion of acting up to
minister his great idea of his office ; both sides in the personal struggle
waited on his decision. Immediately after the parliament of

EDWARD I. AND EDWAED II. 491

Lincoln we find Winchelsey's agents at the Roman court urging
bitter accusations of personal depravity against Langton, and at the
same time the archbishop himself was subjected, as we have seen,
to a piece of petty persecution- at which the king must have con-
nived, in the matter of Theobald of Bar ; l but in the end the pope
acquitted Langton and absolved Winchelsey. This part of the 5j1'ifil10.<L
quarrel ended in 1302, and the same year, by usurping the appoint- cult to use
ments to the sees of Worcester and Norwich, the pope showed both
the great litigants that it was unwise to recognise in him too un-
reservedly the supreme authority that he claimed. Boniface VIII.
met his calamitous doom in 1303, and in that and the following
year Edward was fully employed in Scotland. Benedict XI. was not ^lc^r^L
strong enough, and did not reign long enough, to interfere much in de Petoram
England ; only on one or two occasions do we come upon traces of
his action. I have already called attention to the attempt which he
made through Gerard de Petoraria to collect a tenth which Boniface
had made over to the king.2 That attempt was peremptorily foiled
by Edward, but not finally dealt with until the pope was dead ;
Benedict died on the 6th of July ; the order for the arrest of Gerard Dismissal

• ' of Gerard

is dated on the 5th of July, but he was not sent about his business de retoraria
until the 10th of December, 1304. In the preceding April the pope
had written to the bishop of Durham, directing him to appoint the
bishop of Byblus to the priory of Coldingham, a proposition which
was rejected by the king in the next parliament,3 as prejudicial to
himself and his royal crown. Other cases of interference with
patronage might be found. Edward himself never hesitated to use Benedict's
the papal influence for his own purposes ; in the interregnum that England, ami
followed the death of Benedict, he is found writing to Borne

connivance

advocating the archbishop of York's claim to carry his cross erect in
the province of Canterbury,4 a small matter in itself, but one in
which Winchelsey was specially susceptible ; and there are letters of
the same date, in which he undertakes not to write to the Curia in
opposition to appeals which had been carried there against the
decisions of the ecclesiastical courts at home ; 5 but, although,
perhaps as a political necessity, he had to counteract the aggressive
pretensions of his own bishops more frequently than those of the
popes, he took advantage of the vacancy in the popedom to press
through his parliament of April 1305 an act which forbade the Legation

. against

export of money from the alien monasteries.'' This act, which was export of
no doubt aimed partly at the papal collectors, did not apparently alien monas-

1 See vol. in R. S. p. xxxv. 4 Fcedera, i. 969.

2 Ibid. p. xxxvii. :> Prynne, Records, iii. 1041.

3 Fcedera, i. 069, 970 ; Prynne, " Statutes of the Realm, i. 150,
Records, iii. 1059.

492

CHRONICLES OF THE REIGNS OF

Clement V.

become*

pope

He invites
the king to
bis coro-
nation

Envoys
.-cut with
special in-
structions

Edward's
Bulls of

absolution

receive the assent of the clergy, and did not become law until it was
confirmed by the statute of Carlisle two years after. It is possible
that for the moment it was retarded by the influence of Winchelsey.
whose day of account was now at hand.

Edward was too wise to begin an open struggle with the arch-
bishop whilst the Scots were on his hands. In the spring of 1805
Scotland seemed to be completely subdued ; Wallace was taken and
executed ; Bruce was still at the English court. In the summer the
papacy was filled by the election of Bertrand de Goth, a Gascon
nobleman, archbishop of Bourdeaux, born and promoted within
Edward's French dominions. Bertrand received the triple crown
as Clement V. on the 14th of November, 1805 ; but before this, as
soon as the news of the election reached England, Edward had
concerted his attack on Winchelsey. Clement was anxious that the
ceremony of his coronation should be graced by the presence of the
king or his eldest son, and immediately on his election sent to
England, with the invitation, Raymond, bishop of Lescar, and
William de Testa, archdeacon of Aran, in the Pyrenees,1 a person
who soon after becomes a leading figure in the negotiations. The
king declined the offer on behalf of himself and his son, but he sent
an embassy to Lyons, including among its members Bishop Lang-
ton, the treasurer, Hugh le Despenser, and his two most trusted
friends, Henry de Lacy, earl of Lincoln, and Otho of Grandison.
Besides mere formal credentials in which these envoys were author-
ised to treat on the matters of the Crusade, the canonisation of
Thomas Cantilupe, and other points of smaller interest, they had
letters of recommendation by which the pope was requested to
listen to them on certain businesses which were deep in the heart of
the king, 'quae valde insident cordi nostro.' 2 One of these busi-
nesses was the obligations to which in 1289 and 1801 the king had
been forced to submit, in reference to the forest charters. To the
request for absolution from the oath which the king had taken,
Clement V. listened readily ; the Bulls were expedited before the
end of the year. On the 29th of December the king was released
from his oath,3 and, on the first of January, 1806, a formal prohibi-
tion was issued, by which it was decreed that no sentence of excom-
munication, suspension, or interdict should be issued against him
without special leave from the pope.4 This prohibition left
Winchelsey both personally and politically defenceless, and his
agents at Lyons were able to warn him that worse was coming.

1 Feeders, i. 973 ; Prynne, Records,
iii. 1068.

1 Fcedera, i. 973, 974, 976.

1 Fcedera, i. 978. The Ordinance
of the Forest, issued in consequence

of the absolution, is printed among
the statutes of the realm, dated at
Westminster, May 27. Statutes, i.
147-149; Prynne, Records, iii. 1140.
4 Fcedera, i. 978, 979.

EDWARD I. AND EDWARD II. 493

Bishop Langton was not likely to let the matter rest. He was
not, perhaps, a good bishop, but there is no reason to believe that he pope~agamst
fell below the ordinary moral level of episcopal politicians ; yet, with ^
Winchelsey's connivance, he had been charged with adultery, concu-
binage, simony, and intercourse with the devil. Boniface VIII. had
on these representations suspended him in 1301, but Edward had
explained to the pope that the charges really proceeded from Win-
chelsey's malice, and Langton was acquitted and reinstated in 1303. l

Now his turn was come, and he had the pope's ear. On the He is su?-
12th of February Clement suspended the archbishop and summoned summon^
him to the Curia. The news reached him on the 25th of March £urhtepapal
through Master Thorp,2 the dean of the Arches, whom, in anticipa-
tion perhaps of some hostile move, he had sent to Lyons in the
preceding January. The Bull had not yet arrived, so Winchelsey
betook himself to the king to ask for his gracious intercession.
Edward answered him by recounting the disgrace, contempt, and winciieisey'?
injuries which he had heaped upon him : told him how he had strauceami
nearly driven the kingdom into rebellion, and that it was no fault persistence
of the archbishop's that he was not dethroned ; kindness and
patience had been tried in vain, one of the two must quit the king-
dom.3 Winchelsey could scarcely have replied effectively, for the
charges, although somewhat exaggerated, represented a feeling in
the king's mind which the archbishop's perversity had justified.
Instead of interceding, Edward wrote to the pope declaring that the
archbishop's continued presence was a standing danger to peace.
The letter was written on the 6th of April.4 Winchelsey had to
wait in patience ; on the 18th of May the letters of suspension
reached him,5 and on the morrow before sunrise he set out for Lyons wiucheisey
and crossed the sea. He left no substitute, and from the 18th of
May to the 6th of June the spiritual and temporal administration of
the see was in abeyance. Nothing seems to have happened in conse- '
quence. Winchelsey, however, did not return to England until after
the coronation of Edward II.

Edward I. had not to wait long before he found out with what
dangerous tools he had been playing. Even the accommodating
Clement was not going to lose his vantage-ground ; he was already
prepared to undertake the spiritual and temporal administration of
the archbishopric. William de Testa had spied out the country
when he came to invite the king to the pope's coronation. On the

1 Fcedera, i. 939, 943, 956, 957. 4 Fcedera, i, 983 ; Prynne, Records,

2 Sornner's Battely's Canterbury, iii. 1092.

part ii. App. p. 31. See vol. in R. S. 4 See vol. in R. S. p. 144 ; Somner,

p. 145. p. 31.

3 Birchington, Ang. Sacr. i. 16.

494

CHRONICLES OF TUB REIGNS OF

Tbe pope'*
envoy* claim
the spiritual
administra-
tion of
Canterbury ;
the temporal

La.ijrton

The king
forbids

accept it.

Edward
begs that
WincheUey
may not be

n •ih.-fciti-'l

Difficulties
of the

spiritual ail-
minis tra tors

The king
allows the
temporal
profit* to go
to the pope

6th of June, at Bow church, he and his colleague, William Gerald! de
Sora, published letters dated on the 20th of April, by which the spiritual
administration was committed to them ; in the king's presence they
delivered a similar letter to Bishop Langton, by which the temporal
administration was committed to him. We are curious to know
how this had been contrived, whether the pope was anxious to make
his claim on the temporal administration effectual by appointing the
king's confidential minister, or whether Langton had miscalculated
his master's patience by asking for the office for himself. However
it was, the king was very angry, and immediately replied that he
would never permit the bishop, or anyone else, clerk or lay, native
or alien, deputed or to be deputed by the pope, to interfere with any
temporal matters in his kingdom, any more than the pope permits
him to do in spiritual matters. And having said this he committed
the temporalities of Canterbury to Humfrey of Walden, knight.1

Before the king set out for Scotland in the summer, on the 2nd
of July he wrote again 2 to the pope begging that Winchelsey might
not be restored, and at the same time negotiated for the transfer to
himself of a biennial tenth which had been imposed for the purposes
of the Crusade. This was one of the curiously discreditable shifts
to which Edward's poverty drove him, and which the pope's plia-
bility rendered easy. But the spiritual administration of William
de Testa was not successful ; it consisted principally in the direction
of the court of Arches and the collection of firstfruits. The arch-
bishop's dean of Arches was superseded on the 6th of June, and
Philip Turbeville appointed commissary-general.3 That much was
easy. The collection of the firstfruits of vacant benefices, which
was committed to the papal agents by another Bull, immediately
produced difficulties. The canons of Merton, in Surrey, refused to
pay the impost and prevented the collectors from proceeding with
their task. On the 27th of August the pope wrote to the king to
complain of this.4 Edward had already found that with the
Scottish war on his hands he could not maintain the position which
his brave words had claimed. If the pope was to keep Winchelsey
innocuous, it must be made worth his while. The llth of Septem-
ber the king wrote from Bradley, on the Scottish march, to Clement,5
giving up to him all the profits of the temporal administration to be
applied to his own uses, but adding a petition that Nicolas of
Tingewick, his physician, might be allowed to retain the church of
Reculver, to which he had presented him whilst the temporalities

1 Somner, pp. 31, 32. See also Prynne, Records, iii. 1095, 1098, 1099.

* Fcedera, i. 989 ; Prynne, Records, iii. 1095.

1 See vol. in R. 8. p. 147. ' Foedera, i. 997.

• Foedera, i. 999.

EDWARD I. AND EDAVARD II. 495

were in his hands.1 The pope graciously accepted the surrender and
confirmed the physician in his living. He also determined to send
Cardinal Peter of Spain to attempt the negotiation of a general peace.

Matters were in this state when the famous parliament of Carlisle Parliament
was called. The writs were issued on the 3rd of November,2 and the jau. so,8i307
assembly, which was to be a complete representation of the estates,
was to meet on the 20th of January, 1307, the cause of the meeting
being the settlement of Scotland. The parliament was a very full
one ; the names of the representatives of both clergy and laity are
preserved.3 On the 19th of January the king empowered Bishop
Langton and the earl of Lincoln to open the session, he himself
being at Lanercost. The meeting took place on the 20th, and the
estates sat on the 21st and 29th. Some of the legal transactions of Duration of
the session are dated in full parliament on the 9th of February,
others as late as the 18th and 23rd of March. How long the formal
session continued is uncertain. The cardinal who was expected to
meet it did not reach Carlisle until March. He arrived on or about
the 12th.4 The chief thing that he did was to excommunicate
Robert Bruce, and to make some engagements for Philip IV., which
that king did not confirm. The parliament of Carlisle had thus
time to act whilst waiting for the cardinal. The statute of 1305 for- The Act of
bidding the alien monasteries to export money was confirmed, and firmed
on the 20th of March notified to the sheriffs for execution.5 A more
important feature of the time was the address to the pope, drawn up Petitions
on behalf of the clergy and people of England, recounting the abuses, pi^aTag-
oppressions, and exactions which they had suffered from the mal- s
administration of the papal power.6 Another petition to the king to
the same effect was presented by the nobles and commons, stating
the national grievances in language which subsequently became
classical and was adopted in the great statute of Provisors.7 In this
document William de Testa and his commissaries are singled out
for special animadversion ; and in consequence a series of articles
was exhibited against him.8 He was interrogated in full parliament, wniiam ac
and, being unable to allege in excuse anything beyond his general tioned m
authority from the pope, was regarded as convicted, and forbidden p
by a resolution of the whole parliament to proceed with his exactions ;
his money was to be seized, a report was to be sent to the pope of

1 Fcedera, i. 1000, 1006. 5 Rot. Parl. i. 217 ; Statutes of the

2 Fcedera, i. 1008. Realm, i. 150-152.

3 Rot. Parl. i. 188, 189, 204. 6 Rot. Parl. i. 207, 208 ; Prynne,

4 The day fixed for the cardinal's Records, iii. 1174.

visit was March 12, and on the 16th 7 Rot. Parl. i. 219 ; Prynne, Re-
letters of safe-conduct were issued for cords, iii. 1168-1170.
his departure (Fcedera, i. 1009) ; but it 8 Rot. Parl. i. 220 : Prynne, Re-
is not improbable that he arrived cords, iii. 1171.
earlier, and he certainly stayed longer.

496

CHRONICLES OF THE REIGNS OF

Legal pro-
ceedings
instituted

The cardinal
of Spain
oaes his In-
fluence to
stop the
proceedings

Policy of the
English

Death of
Edward I.,
and fall of
Bishop
Laugton

Farther op-
position of
Langton aud
Wlucbelscy

his misdoings, and the sheriffs were directed to arrest his agents
and bring them before the king in the ensuing Trinity term. The
writs for this purpose were issued on the 22nd of March.1 It is
therefore probable that the whole of these proceedings had been
prepared before the arrival of the cardinal. He is not mentioned
as present during the discussion, but unfortunately stayed with the
king after the estates had separated. Notwithstanding the writs of
the 22nd of March which had been issued with parliamentary
authority, the cardinal persuaded the king on the 26th to restore
the temporal administration of Canterbury to William de Testa,*
and on the 4th of April to take the culprits into his protection, and
to sanction the collection of the firstfruits.3 By other writs he
empowered William de Testa to execute his office as envoy of the
pope and administrator of Canterbury. The day fixed for the trial
of the agents came, but, at the beginning of Trinity term, instead
of appearing as culprits they presented to the council a series of
complaints that they were hindered from the performance of their
duty. They presented the letters of April 4, and the council
examined them.4 They found, in close agreement with the policy
of their master, that the latter writs only empowered the papal
agents to collect the firstfruits, so far as it was in the king's power
to authorise it ; and forbade them to persist in the oppressions
which were injurious to the king and his faithful subjects. These
saving words explained away all that the writs seemed to have
granted, and a peremptory prohibition against their further pro-
ceedings was issued on the 27th of June.5 This was delivered to
them by the mayor and aldermen of London. Before they could
determine on the next step to be taken Edward I. died. Nothing
more was done in the matter. The whole of the situation changed.
Within a few days Bishop Langton was removed from office, to be
arrested, kept in prison and disgrace for years. Winchelsey was to
return in triumph. From this time, although the tlame broke out
again and again, as in the parliament of Stamford, when a bill of
gravamina, corresponding with that of Carlisle, was drawn up and
sent to the pope, the new quarrels of the new reign were for the
most part on other points. For a short time Winchelsey was on
the side of Edward II., but he very soon found himself hand and
glove with Lancaster. When his opposition became overt, after the
publication of the ordinances, Edward made his peace with Langton
and restored him to liberty and office. But Winchelsey died before

1 Hot. Parl. i. 221, 222. 4 Rot. Parl. i. 222, 223 ; Prynne,

2 Fcedera, i. 1012; Prynne, Records, Records, iii. 1181.

iii. 1179. * Rot. Parl. i. 223 ; Prynne, Re-

• Foedera, i. 1014 ; Rot. Parl. i. cords, iii. 1182.
222 Prynne, iii. 1178, 1179.

EDWARD I. AND EDWAKD II. 497

the king's difficulties became insurmountable, and after his death
his rival became insignificant ; he too died before the final crisis of
the reign, during the period which intervened between the banish-
ment and the recall of the Despensers.

It is interesting: to know that William de Testa, after Winchel- Fortunes

..,,.« , n , i . f ,, . . f i • of William

sey s restoration, faithfully accounted to him for the receipts of his de Testa
administration, making him much richer than he had ever been
before.1 William himself was made a cardinal in 1812, and long
survived all the other actors in the struggle.

The story I have told shows us a curious close of a great and in curious
some respects glorious reign ; we see the old king fighting with those on the
favourite weapons from which he had never gained anything but Echrard i°£
discredit ; holding by the letter of an engagement, taking his stand
on the wording of a writ ; balancing between the pope and the
national clergy ; buying the leave of the one to tax the other, and
availing himself of the independent spirit of the one to avoid paying
the price of the services of the other. His poverty and his eccle-
siastical troubles, throughout his reign, are connected together, and
serve to bring out the weak points of his character as a king and as
a man. We have to remember, however, in an equitable view of the
matter, the greatness of his exigencies, and the overwhelming power
and prestige of the papacy. It was comparatively easy for Edward I-
to overawe the national clergy, to cripple its acquisitiveness, to limit
its judicial ambitions, and to put the whole of its members into out-
lawry. But with the pope he must temporise. A later king whose His excuses
exigencies were less pressing, of much stronger will and much less dif
scrupulous integrity, in a still more critical juncture, had to play
with a weaker pope a game of diplomacy still more complicated and
still more full of snares for honest dealing. Henry VIII. in his
dealing with the annates and Peterpence had not less than Edward I.
to play fast and loose with his people ; to make the execution of his
statutes contingent on the next move of the Curia.

Another somewhat obscure episode of our history, on which the Another
annals now edited and the companion records throw a fresh light, crisfs"0"
is the period of the dominion of Mortimer and Isabella, who for
nearly four years exercised supreme power in England, which they
lost by a revolution more abrupt and scarcely lest just than that by
which they had gained it. The fall of Edward II. was the result,
no doubt to a great extent, of his own incapacity for government or
for attracting the affections of his people, and to a great extent, also,
of a general rising against the tyranny of the Despensers. But if we
look more narrowly at the influences which guided the rising and

1 A. Murim. p. 12; cf. Angl. Sac. i. 51.

K E

498

CHRONICLES OF THE REIGNS OF

The three
great pnrtiec

took tho benefit of the revolution we shall see that it was not mere
incapacity or mere tyranny provoking a general outburst. In truth
Edward's victory over the discontented barons in 1822 had been too
great a victory : it had destroyed the forces between which it would
have been safer to hold the balance. Throughout the reign there had
been three parties in the country : a royal party, comprising a few
powerful bishops and barons, strong, however, rather in hereditary
or official than in personal greatness ; a party, under the headship of
the earl of Lancaster, which was hereditarily opposed to royal
aggression, which to some extent represented the baronage of 1265.
and which, although unfortunate in its leader, who was an ill-
tempered and violent man, still to a certain extent possessed claims
on popular affection as the ' good lords ' or party of freedom. There
was a third, a mediating party, a party of politiques, without any
affection for the king or any aspirations for freedom, which was
simply anxious to gain and hold power. This party was led at one
period by Badlesmere, D'Amory, and Pembroke, the last of whom
was personally faithful to the king. In the early struggle of the
reign, when Piers Gaveston was the object of detestation to both
court and people, these two parties had acted together. After the
fall of the favourite they had broken up into two sets, and had been
rival aspirants to supreme power over the king. At one time he was
held in the fierce grip of Lancaster, at another in the more friendly
but scarcely less irksome hold of Pembroke. The two Despensers
under whose influence he ultimately won his victory, and who
shared his doom, had not been consistent in adhesion either to him
or to either of the rival parties in the baronage, and it is a curious
fact that the very assertion of principle which was set by the earlier
barons at the head of their attack on Gaveston, the doctrine that
the allegiance of the subject is due to the office rather than to the
person of the king was, in so many words, made the ground of a
charge against the younger Hugh in 1821. l Another charge made
against him, of forming a political league with Sir John Giffard and
Sir Richard Grey 2 for exercising undue influence over Edward, bears
exactly the same relation to the covenant between Pembroke,
Badlesmere, and D'Amory for tho creation of the third party.3 In
1811 the elder Hugh le Despenser had been supposed to be on the
side of Gaveston, whilst in 1816 the younger Hugh had filled the
high office of chamberlain under the Lancaster administration. We
may conclude that the father and son, when they finally threw in
their lot with the king, would be regarded as deserters of the parties

See vol. in R. 8. p. 153. * Statutes of the Realm, i. 182.

1 Parliamentary Writs, II. ii. 120.

EDWARD I. AND EDWARD II. 499

to which they had belonged before, and the son was the most for-
midable claimant of the Gloucester honours in rivalry with Audley,
who belonged to the Lancaster, and D'Aamory, who belonged to the
Badlesmere alliance. Hostility to the Despensers again united these combina-
parties in 1321, and the Despensers were exiled. The following parties, for
year the king had his revenge; Lancaster's hatred for Badlesmere throw of the
enabled the king to crush them both, and he had no mercy. DesPenserg
He was after the battle of Boroughbridge master of the situation. The king's
But if he had destroyed his enemies, he had not learned to anTfffn
make or to manage his friends ; he could not govern and they
misgoverned. The desertion and treason of his wife, brothers, and
son left him at the disposal of the Despensers ; the earl of Pembroke
was dead ; the personal friends of the king were powerless where
they were not dangerous. Thus the wretched man perished. Again Eevivai of
all parties rallied against his favourites ; the Lancastrians under parties
Earl Henry and Bishop Stratford, the Badlesmere party under bishops
Orlton and Burghersh ; the hold on the queen and her son possessed
by Mortimer obtained for him the aid of the latter party, and they
accomplished the revolution. The prizes of dominion were divided
among the victors : Lancaster was to guide the council, the queen's
bishops were to administer affairs ; Mortimer's personal influence with
Isabella and Edward lodged the real power, unfettered by council or
ministry, in his unscrupulous hands. Mortimer himself had not
been a politician ; as Despenser hereditarily represented the
popular party of 1265, Mortimer hereditarily represented the royal
party, but in both personal ambitions outweighed constitutional
propensions.

I do not propose to follow into detail the events of 1327 and Unpopu-
1328 ; it is enough to say that, whereas the new government by its Mortimer's
unpopular foreign policy lost the national regard which it had won 8
by domestic legislation, it contained in itself an element of division
which was incurable. The old Lancaster party had revenged its TheLancas-

tcr DRTV

wrongs and now fell back on its old political principles ; the strengthened
dominant court party knew that they had no political strength and
held to office as the end and guarantee of their existence. Moreover
the Lancastrian party had never been actuated by the personal
hatred of the late king which was a leading feeling in Mortimer and
Isabella. After the death of Edward II. the rift widened ; Lancaster
found his position a sinecure and a pretence, with no real power
and no real responsibility ; his friends were left out of office, and his
very safety was problematical. The queen and the young king, and
not less the great ministries of state, were under Mortimer's hand ;
and Edward was beginning his reign with proceedings of wanton
terrorism and extortion. Parliaments were multiplied, but no

K K 2

500

CHRONICLES OF THE REIGNS OF

Parliament
of Salisbury,
Oct. 1S8H

Tumultuous
proceedings

The king
marches
against the
Lancaster
party at
Winchester

Parliament
opened

Flight of
Stratford

remedial legislation resulted ; taxes were granted, but every proper
function of government was in abeyance.

Matters were in this stage when the parliament of Salisbury was
called to meet on the 16th of October 1828 ; it was the fourth
parliament of the year ; two sessions had been held at York and one
at Northampton. The archbishopric of Canterbury was just filled
up by the appointment of Mepeham. The country had been kept
alive with tournaments, which were probably the pretexts for
dangerous meetings of the discontented lords. And many lords
were discontented. The two younger sons of Edward I., Kent and
Norfolk, were drawing nearer to Lancaster. Bishop Stratford of
Winchester was the political guide of that party. Orlton and
Burghersh were with Mortimer. Other prelates halted between the
two, for they knew that the whole order was unpopular. The
misgovernment of the last reign was generally attributed to the
prelates, some of whom were distinctly evil men, and the great
majority weak ones.

It was not without apprehensions that the estates met ; and the
leaders came at the head of armed retinues. This was contrary to
rule, and contrary even to an order which the government had just
issued. The rival factions had fights on Salisbury Plain. The earl
of Lancaster refused to come into the city, and remained with his
friends and retainers at Winchester, whither the king, at Mortimer's
suggestion, marched in hostile guise against him. The earl fled
before the king, but the intention of resistance was regarded as a
crime for which pardon had afterwards to be obtained.1 The prelates
ran still greater risks ; Bishop Stratford, who was lodged at the
nunnery of Wilton, narrowly escaped assassination by Mortimer's
emissaries.2

The parliament was opened by the bishop of Lincoln, the chan-
cellor, and Walter Hervey, archdeacon of Salisbury, as the king's
commissioners.3 It continued in session until the 81st of October.
It is probable that the assembly met, as in 1884, in the great hall of
the bishop's palace, and that the estates when they separated sat in
the houses of the canons or in the chapter-house. The prelates
certainly met in a separate house. Of the debates nothing is known.
The deliberations of the bishops were broken in upon by Mortimer
and his armed force ; ' Bishop Stratford fled in alarm first to his
manor at Downton •"' and thence to Winchester, notwithstanding the
king's express order that none should leave the city during the

19.

1 Rot. Parl. ii. 52, 255, 443.

2 Birchington, Anglia Sacra,

* Fcedera, ii. 752, 753 ; Report on

the Dignity of a Peer, i. 492;
Parl. ii. 443.

4 Rot. Parl. ii. 52.

4 Birchington, Ang. Sac. i. 19.

Rot.

EDWAED I. AND EDWAKD II. 501

session. No statutes were passed, no taxes granted ; a few entries
on the Close Kolls represent all the business that was transacted ;
and the creation of three new earls, one of whom was Mortimer creation
himself, was the whole ostensible result. But the break-up of the
parliament was the first great overt sign of the general discontent.

At the close Edward and the court removed to Wallingford, Attempts
whence on the llth of November were issued letters ordering the stratford
sheriff of Hampshire to bring Bishop Stratford before the king in
the ensuing Hilary term to answer for his contempt of the royal
order.1 The bishop did not comply, but fled from Winchester to
Waltham, hiding occasionally in the neighbouring woods. The
court from Wallingford went to London, spent a week at West-
minster early in December, and then proceeded northwards.

As soon as the court had left the opposition set to work. Archbishop Meeting of
Mepeham saw before him a chance of following in the steps of Stephen barons at "'
Langton ; he came to S. Paul's on the 18th of December and met a DeaTs'8'
company of earls and bishops.2 The first thing to be done was to col-
lect a body of magnates who could be depended upon. That day were summons
issued letters of summons, in the names of the earls of Kent and faithful lords
Norfolk, for a meeting at London to treat of the dangers imminent ;
the king was riding about the country with an armed multitude, and,
contrary to the Great Charter and his coronation oath, was plunder-
ing, seizing, and destroying his faithful peers.3 Among the lords Composition
who took upon them this dangerous responsibility were, besides the
two royal earls and the bishops of London and Winchester, the
lord Wake, son-in-law of the earl of Lancaster, and brother-in-law of
the earl of Kent, and Hugh of Audley, the competitor with Hugh le
Despenser for the Gloucester earldom.4 The news of the negotiation
soon reached the court, and Mortimer prepared to set up the royal
standard. The lords, who were not quite ready for open war, sent the Message to
archdeacon of E ssex , John of Elham, to persuade the king to desist, but
the appeal was in vain. The earl of Lancaster kept Christmas at Uneasy
Waltham, the earl of Norfolk at Blackfriars, and the archbishops and
bishops at S. Paul's. The earls of Norfolk and Lancaster had been
at feud in consequence of the execution of Robert, lord Holland, who
had been beheaded as a traitor to the late earl Thomas, whilst in
some way or other he was under the protection of the earl of Norfolk.
The prelates spent an anxious week, for the king sent no answer,
and the earl of Lancaster gave no sign. The bishop of Rochester Tueabsteii-

, . ., . . tion of the

excused himself on account of his health, and on receiving an express bishop of
command from the archbishop, who was his liege lord in temporals
as well as spirituals, returned the same answer. Mepeham was very

1 Fcedera, ii. 753. 3 W. Dene, Ang. Sacra, i. 368.

2 See vol. in R. S. p. 343. 4 See vol. in R. S. p. 344.

502

CHRONICLES OF THE REIGNS OF

Meeting of
the lords.
Jan. 1, 1329

Demands of
the lords

Mortimer
ravages the
Leicester
earldom

Lancaster
marches
against him

angry, and remarked with a scoff, ' The hishop of Rochester delights
himself in quietness ' ; whereto one of his people pleasantly said, ' He
wants to be " A per se," alone by himself.' This being told to the
bishop he said, ' I would rather be " A per se " than with the other
letters,' meaning the other bishops assembled at London. He was
astonished that the primate in the depth of winter should go to
London to treat behind the king's back on false pretext and real
motives which were not revealed to the archbishop himself.1 It is
probable that the royal earls were mistrusted by the baronage at
large, and the assemblage that accepted their invitation was not a
large one.

However, on New Year's Day, the earl of Lancaster came up
from Waltham with a large retinue, paid his respects to the bishops
at S. Paul's, and went on to Blackfriars, where he was formally
reconciled with the earl of Norfolk.- The next day a solemn
assembly was held in the cathedral, and articles were drawn up
containing the points of grievance against the king, with which the
archbishop, the bishop of London, and the king's two uncles were
sent to the court. They demanded that Mortimer and the queen
should live on their own property and allow the king the proper use
of his own ; that inquiry should be made as to the causes of the
success of the Scots ; that account should be given of the transfer
of authority from the royal council appointed at the coronation, of
the expenditure of the late king's treasure, the surrender 3 of the
king's rights over Scotland, and the disparagement of his sister by
her Scottish marriage. Mortimer was on the alert. He had already
begun to ravage the earl of Lancaster's estates, and was leading a
large force against the town of Leicester,4 the capital of the earl's
possessions in middle England. On the 4th of January the royal
army occupied Leicester, and he ravaged the country for eight days.
The embassy had no influence with the king, but the earls of Kent
and Norfolk were persuaded to detach themselves from the enter-
prise which they themselves had started. Lancaster accordingly,
with the bishops of London and Winchester, and the lords Wake
and Audley, marched towards Leicester. They were joined by
several other barons who had taken a prominent part in the politics
of the late reign ; the old adventurer, Henry de Beaumont, who
had been involved in Gaveston's disgrace, and had deserted Edward
II. in his later troubles ; Sir William Trussell, the proctor of the
parliament who had in the name of the nation renounced allegiance
to Edward of Carnarvon ; Thomas de Wyther, who had beheaded
Robert of Holland, and Sir Thomas de Roscelin.* The Londoners

1 W. Dene, Ang. Sac. i. 3IJ9.
1 See vol. in K. S. p. 343.

* Barnes, Edward III. pp. 31, 32.
< Knighton, o. 2554. 3 Ibid.

EDWARD I. AND EDWAED II. 503

helped the Lancastrian cause with a contingent of 600 men, an The London
offence for which they were afterwards called to account. With coutinseut
such an army as these influential lords could collect, Lancaster
marched to Bedford, where he encamped, intending to await the Lancaster
approach of Mortimer ; and at Bedford he received the information ^4^,4,
that the two earls, the king's uncles, had gone over to Mortimer. ^"rive
He had difficulty in keeping order in his own camp, and as soon as wa?
the royal forces appeared he had no better policy than submission.
The king's grace was vouchsafed to him at the petition of the arch-
bishop and in consideration of a fine of 11,OOOZ. A promise was
made that the complaints alleged should receive redress in the next
parliament, a promise made compulsory by the alarm of a general
rising. Lancaster was able to obtain immunity for his own imme-
diate friends, but Henry de Beaumont, Trussell, Wyther, and Punishment
Roscelin had to leave the kingdom, and the citizens of London, herents
among whom Hamo of Chigwell was the representative man, were
left at the king's mercy.1 This pacification must have taken place
about the 12th or 13th of January.

As soon as the tumult was over Mepeham went to Canterbury to church
celebrate the festival of his enthronement, and before the end of
January was again in London holding an ecclesiastical council.
On the 22nd Edward, as the Annales Londonienses record, was Proceedings
setting the legal machinery to work, to punish Hamo of Chigwell Hanwof
and his companions ; and on the 9th of February parliament was
to meet, by adjournment from the abortive session at Salisbury.
This assembly was in session from the 9th to the 22nd of February, Parliament
but it has left no act on the statute roll and no record of proceedings.2 1329
The citizens of London who had taken part in the rising were
indicted on divers pretexts during the sitting of the parliament, and
several of them were hanged. We have seen how narrowly Hamo
of Chigwell escaped.

It is needless to observe that the promises of redress which Further
Mortimer had made at Bedford were never fulfilled ; nor were the
recalcitrant earls, even after penitence, really forgiven. In the
summer of 1329 the young king and queen went to France ; a grand
ceremonial of pacification took place in September after their return ;
and early in 1330 Queen Philippa was crowned. Thus time was Mortimer's
given for the concocting of the cruel plot by which Mortimer
wreaked his first vengeance on the earl of Kent, whom he found
means of persuading that his hapless brother Edward of Carnarvon
was still alive. The curious evidence which from time to time has
been fabricated to show that Edward escaped from Berkeley Castle

1 Knighton, ce. 2554, 2555.

3 Fcedera, ii. 750 ; Report on the Dignity of a Peer, i. 492.

504

CHRONICLES OF THE REIGNS OF

Curious
sequence of

rvi-nt-

Permanence
of heredi-
tary politics

and lived and died in exile must be reserved for separate treatment
hereafter. Such as it was, it tempted earl Edmund to his doom ;
the terror of his fate roused up in the royal house and in the young
sovereign himself the determination to get rid of Mortimer. By one
of the strangest pieces of medieval placability, within little more
than half a century we find the heir of Mortimer heir of the crown
of England ; the daughter of the earl of Kent married to the 'son of
Sir Robert Holland, and the house of Holland joined in unhappy
marriages with the families of the White and Red Rose, until the
middle ages close in the deluge of civil war.

The struggle between the rival administrations which had risen
by the support of the Mortimer and Lancaster parties continued as
a struggle between two court factions long after the death of
Mortimer, and the animosity which long survived the chief actors
broke out in 1841 in the quarrel between Edward III. and Archbishop
Stratford : Burghersh was dead, but Orlton was as malicious as
ever. But this portion of history lies for the present too far ahead,
and is itself perhaps only a link in the later complications of a long
and tedious reign.

EDWARD I. AND EDWAED II. 505

CHEONICLES OF THE KEIGNS OF EDWAKD I.
AND EDWAED II. VOL. II.

[The following is a portion of the Preface to a volume containing four
works dealing with the reign of Edward II. In one of these works, the
Commendatio Lamentabilis, is to be found a comparison of Edward I.'s
personal appearance, with that of Henry II. ' Henry was of middle
height, Edward was very tall, a head taller than the generality of his
subjects ; Henry had a small nose, Edward a long one ; Henry was ruddy,
red-haired, and blue-eyed ; Edward had black and curly hair, and his
eyes were probably dark also.' Such is Bishop Stubbs's summary of a
portion of the chronicler's description of the two kings. Both men were
fond of hunting, both able and original legislators, both eloquent, cautious,
and patient. Edward II. was very different from both Edward I. and
Henry II. ; Bishop Stubbs's sketch of his reign brings out many interesting
points.]

******

THE reign of Edward II. possesses, in its more prominent events, an character of
extraordinary amount of tragic interest ; but outside of the dramatic Edward n.
crises it may be described as exceedingly dreary. There is a miser-
able level of political selfishness which marks without exception
every public man ; there is an absence of sincere feeling except in
the shape of hatred and revenge ; there is a profession of economic
and reforming zeal which never comes into practice, and there is
no great triumph of good or evil to add a moral or inspire a sympathy.
This absence of inspiring topics renders certain parts of the reign The middle
simply unreadable ; yet there are great quantities of records which especLny8"
are, as a series, instructive enough, and capable of a good deal of d
antiquarian illustration. This is true of the whole of the reign, but
especially true of the years that intervene between the death of
Gaveston and the attack on the Despensers. During this period the
national history may be summed up as a series of attempts made by Party
the party of the earl of Lancaster to reduce the king to impotence,
on the pretext of compelling him to observe the Ordinances ; inter-
rupted from time to time by renewals of the Scottish war, which
constrained the conflicting parties to a show of reconciliation and

506

CHRONICLES OF THE REIGNS OF

Kv-concilin-
tiou after
Gave* ton'*
death

Lancaster
supreme hi
131C

Intrigues of
the year 1317

New ordi-
nances pro-
posed

Lancaster
offended

joint action ; and by a series of intrigues and counter-intrigues to
obtain, for a party independent of the earl of Lancaster, a hold on
the royal administration. The king all the time, whether working
underhand against Lancaster, or acting overtly against him under
the influence of a body of allies in whom he had no confidence, is
gradually being thrown more and more completely and helplessly on
the support of the Despensers, who finally get him entirely under
their hands.

Gaveston perished in June 1812 ; the second half of that year
and the whole of the next were occupied with negotiations for
reconciliation ; the parties reconciled joined in the war with Robert
Bruce ; the battle of Bannockburn furnished Lancaster with a con-
vincing argument of the king's incapacity and of the importance
of the Ordinances. Gradually almost all power slipped out of the
king's hands, and in the parliament of Lincoln, held in January 1816,
the earl was made chief counsellor, and restraints were placed on
the action of the king, who was to undertake nothing important or
arduous without the consent of the earls and barons. Edward had
nothing better to do than to confirm the Ordinances, and try, by
satisfying the demands of the clergy, to secure some measure of
peace and some supplies of money.

This state of things did not continue long. The king tried to
make a party of his own, and different clusters of courtiers organised
themselves in parties too, to take advantage of the first opportunity
that might arrive of gaining power on the pretext of freeing him.
The year 1817 was a period of intrigue and private war. Lancaster,
as we learn from a valuable letter preserved by the Bridlington
historian,1 had attempted, in his office of chief counsellor, to impose
some new ordinances. A committee had been appointed in the
Lincoln parliament to reform the administration, and of this
committee, which included bishops and earls, the leading men were
Lancaster himself, Archbishop Reynolds who was supposed to be
committed heart and soul to the king's side, and Bartholomew, lord
Badlesmere. who was an enemy of Lancaster and only cared for the
king as the fulcrum to be used for the promotion of his own ambi-
tion of governing. Ordinances were framed and were sent in writing
to the king by the hands of Badlesmere and Inge the chief justice.
Of course nothing was done, and the precise purport of the ordinances
themselves is not now to be recovered. The earl was violently
offended, and his sulky attitude strengthened the hands of the
intriguing parties at the court. But matters went further. Early
in 1817 the king called councils which Lancaster refused to attend.8

1 Sec vol. in R. S. pp. 50, 51.

2 Mon. Malmesb. vol. in R. S. pp. 220-228, and notes.

EDWABD I. AND EUWABD II. 507

He sent to the pope to ask for absolution from his oath to the Edward

Ordinances and for a sentence against the Scots. The pope declined thTpope

both requests ; the Ordinances were drawn up by men who could

be trusted with the interests of both church and crown ; the Scots

were not to be condemned until the cause had been tried on its

merits ; if the king would devote his energies to the crusade the

clergy might grant him money, not otherwise. The pope's advice

was thrown away. The courtiers advised defiance of Lancaster and intrigues

the prosecution of the Scottish war, to which the great earl was Lancaster

known to be opposed. The earl of Warenne was now the king's

confidant. By his agency the countess of Lancaster ' was enabled

to elope from her husband ; and it was believed that the scheme for

her abduction was contrived in royal council at Clarendon. The

earl immediately began to prepare his revenge by enlisting strong Threatenmgs

• 11 11 • PI • i of civil war

forces of retainers and by collecting the barons of his party and the
numerous and powerful vassals of his own five earldoms. To
counteract these machinations, and to draw his own force to the
north, the king issued orders for the assembly of the council at
Nottingham on the twenty-first of July, followed by a summons to
muster at Newcastle on the morrow of S. Lawrence, August 11.
Lancaster refused to attend the council. His letter in answer to Lancaster's
the king's remonstrance is preserved by the Bridlington annalist,2 attend a
and the Malmesbury historian furnishes the argument which his
agents offered in the court. He would not attend the council because
the business to be treated of was such as, according to the Ordinances,
could only be treated in parliament. He would, however, obey the
summons to Newcastle. In the meantime he collected his forces at
Pomfret.3 Edward, after holding the council at Nottingham, took
up his quarters at York on the 8th of September. For a fortnight The king and

. earl watch

the two rival powers watched one another ; the earl refused the pne another
king's followers leave to cross the Aire at Castleford ; the king did
not feel strong enough to dislodge him ; the bishops and barons
interposed their good offices and a meeting was agreed on. The
earl was told that if he attended the conference it was at the peril
of life or liberty, and the meeting did not take place.4 But the
autumn was wasted ; on the 24th of September 5 it was determined
that a parliament should be held in the following January at Lincoln
where all complaints were to be satisfied, and the king marched The km?

goes to the

southward, passing by Pomfret, notwithstanding the remonstrances south
of the earl of Pembroke, in full battle array."

1 The most circumstantial account 3 Mon. Malmesb. vol. in B. S. p. 230.
of this business is, I think, given by 4 Mon. Malmesb. ibid.

Hall's Continuator of Trivet, pp. 20, 5 Parl. Writ. II. i. 171.

21, 22. B See vol. in E. S. p. 231 ; Cont.

2 See vol. in B. S. pp. 50, 51. Trivet, pp. 23, 24.

508

CHRONICLES OF THE REIGNS OF

Onlcr for
pence

Captare of

I;, r.vi.-k

Confedera-
tion be-
tween Pem-
broke and
Badlesnierc

League
made by

Neither party had taken much by the move ; the private war
between Lancaster and Warenne had really broken out in Yorkshire,
where Lancaster had taken the castles of his rival, and some of his
riotous followers had seized Knaresborough.1 On the 3rd of
November the king issued stringent orders for peace. The parlia-
ment summoned for January was not held, being postponed by
successive writs to March, and afterwards to June. The capture of
Berwick by the Scots in April 1818 served for a warning of the
necessity of reconciliation.

It is at this juncture that we come upon a very extraordinary
document thoroughly illustrative of the state of political morality.
On the 24th of November, that is just at the moment when both
Edward and the earl had put themselves decidedly in the wrong, and
each had shown that he was too weak to coerce the other, a new
party is formed to grasp at the reins of power. The leaders of this
confederation were Badlesmere and Pembroke. Badlesmere was the
open enemy of the earl of Lancaster ; Pembroke, who perhaps was
the king's wisest and truest friend, had never forgiven the stain
thrown on his honour by the seizure of Gaveston ; but he probably
saw through the designs of Lancaster, and had determined to head
the opposition. In the curious indenture referred to, we find Rogar
D'Amory, the husband of one of the Gloucester heiresses, binding
himself in a sum of 10,OOOZ. sterling to give his whole diligence and
legal influence with the king to induce him to let himself be guided
and governed by the counsels of Pembroke and Badlesmere and to
trust their counsels beyond all other people on earth, so far as they
shall advise him to the honour and profit of himself, his crown, and
his kingdom ; he will himself act according to their counsels, and
will not trespass against them in any point ; nor will he agree to
the king making grants beyond twenty pounds in land, or doing any
other business of importance without their acquiescence.'2 It is
possible that this agreement is one of a set by which others of the
king's council formed themselves into an inner council to hold power
and restrain the king's extravagance. But it is clear that the
purpose of the league was hostile to Lancaster ; and, although we
do not know that it included the earl Warenne and the other
Gloucester claimants, we are told by the Malmesbury writer that
Audley and Despenser as well as D'Amory were among the great
earl's enemies.

The parliament called for January 27, 1818, was on the 4th of

1 It will be remembered that this
important Honour, which was after-
wards and is still a considerable
member of the Duchy of Lancaster,
was now in the king's hands, having

fallen, with the rest of the possessions
of the earldom of Cornwall, as an
escheat on the death of Gaveston.

* Parl. Writs, II. ii. 120.

' See vol. in It. S. p. 235.

EDWARD I. AND EDWARD II.

509

that month postponed to the 12th of March by the advice of the
lords who were desirous of making terms with Lancaster. It was
to have met at Lincoln, but the difficulties which led to the first
postponement led to a second, and on the 3rd of March it was
countermanded, to meet on the 19th of June at the same place. In
the interval a council was held at Leicester,1 to which the Bridlington
writer gives the name of parliament, but which was really a
conference of representative members of both parties attended by
the chancellor.

Berwick was taken by the Scots on the 2nd of April, and the
council at Leicester, which sat on the 12th, was awed into harmony.
The archbishop and five bishops, three earls, twenty-eight barons,
and two judges swore to maintain the Ordinances ; a new scheme
for general reconciliation was set on foot, and one of the terms of
pacification was that the two Despensers were to be retained by the
earl of Lancaster with a service of two hundred horse ; prisoners
were to be released and charters of pardon issued.2 The earl of
Warenne, however, was not to be pardoned for assisting in the
countess of Lancaster's elopement. It was time that something
should be done. The Scots had burned Northallerton and carried
their devastations as far as Bolton. The king ordered the gentlemen
of Yorkshire to collect the forces of the county, and prepared to go
northwards himself. But the earl would not obey the summons to
parliament, and on the 4th of June the king gave up the idea of
holding one, recalled the summons to Lincoln, and issued writs for
a military levy to meet at York on the 26th of July.3 On the 8th of
June at S. Paul's he declared himself ready to confirm the Ordin-
ances.4 Early in July he came to Northampton, the earl being
at Tutbury.5 The court was at Northampton from July 4th to
the 4th of August, during which time the chancellor travelled back-
wards and forwards to negotiate a treaty of peace between the two.6
On the 31st of July a general pardon was issued to the Lancaster
partisans,7 and on the 14th of August the cousins met at Hathern,8
near Loughborough, and gave each other the kiss of peace. The

Postpone-
ment of
parliament

1 Mon. Malmesb. p. 233 ; Bridling-
ton, p. 54 ; Parl. Writs, II. ii. 122.
- Bridlington, vol. in R. S. p. 55.

3 Parl. Writs, II. i. 501.

4 Annales Paulini, i. 282; Parl.
Writs, II. i. 181.

1 The conversations between the
earl and the chancellor are recorded
by Knighton, c. 2535, who says that
they took place at Tutbury, the head
of the Derby earldom. The bishops
of Norwich and Ely were the mes-
sengers, the latter being chancellor.

Great
Council at
Leicester,
April 1318

Military
preparations

General
pacification
in August
1318

a Parl. Writs, II. ii. 123, 124.

7 Ibid. 125.

8 Ann. Paul. i. 283 ; Cont.
Trivet, p. 27. Knighton, c. 2534,
makes the place of meeting Syroches
brigge, ' quee modo vocatur Sotes-
bryge ' ; and the Bridlington writer,
vol. in R. S. p. 55, calls it ' Sortebrigge
juxta Lughteburghe.' Possibly it is
the place called Zouch-bridge in the
Ordnance map, where the Soar is
crossed near Hathern.

510

CHRONICLES OF THE REIGNS OF

Tenni of
agreement

Operations
of 1319 and

13JO

Battle of
Myton

Edward's
visit to
France

Gathering
of the ptorni
against the

terms had been sealed on the 9th at Leek in Staffordshire, and were
to be submitted to a parliament which was to meet on the 20th of
October at York. Any plan of a campaign against the Scots was
now impracticable. The parliament met at York and confirmed the
terms of what was really a surrender on the part of the king.

Edward had been represented in the negotiations by Pembroke
and Badlesmere, who may thus be understood to have made good
their position to the council, with the earl of Arundel, four bishops
and four barons, one of whom was Roger Mortimer.1 These agreed
that the king should confirm the Ordinances and issue the requisite
pardons ; and that a standing committee of council should be
appointed to reside constantly with the king. Two bishops, one
earl, one baron, and one banneret nominated by Lancaster were to
attend for three months at a time ; what could be done without
parliament they were to do, and their administration was to be
reviewed by parliament. The estates at York ratified the scheme,
and continued the earl's nominees in their places. The younger
Despenser was also appointed or confirmed as chamberlain.2

I must pass over the two following years, during the greater part
of which the king was employed in the north, the court being at
York from October 1818 to January 1820, and the siege of Berwick
being pressed with more ardour than vigilance. The rapid incursion
of the Scots in September 1819, during which the archbishop with
the men of Yorkshire was defeated at Myton, and which carried
devastation over Airedale and Wharfedale and to the gates of
Pomfret, had the effect of raising the siege of Berwick, and rousing
in their bitterest form the king's suspicions of Earl Thomas. The
earl did indeed offer to purge himself of the charges against him,3
but he would not attend a council which was held without a parlia-
ment. His declaration that that parliament should not be held in
cameris 4 is perhaps the most distinct enunciation that we have of
his constitutional policy. After the king's visit to France in the
summer, and an uneasy parliament held in October at Westminster,
the alarms of civil war began to be heard again.

As I am attempting in this sketch mainly to direct attention to
the material additions to our knowledge contributed by the authorities
before us, I will not repeat the story of the quarrel about Gower,
which seems to have thrown the younger Despenser into permanent
hostility to the party supported by Lancaster. The earl himself was
not directly concerned in the Glamorganshire quarrel, but, as usual,
was willing to contribute to any movement of disturbance. By this
time also the influence of Badlesmere had waned, and the king had

Parl. Writs, II. i. 184, 185. » Mon. Malmesb. vol. in R. S. p. 249.

* Statutes of the Realm, i. 181. 4 Ibid. p. 250.

EDWARD I. AND EDWAED II. 511

yielded himself entirely to the guidance of the Despensers. It may,
however, be useful here again to mark the dates of the more im-
portant incidents.

As soon as Edward returned from France, in July 1320, he Parliament
summoned on the 5th of August a meeting of the lords and commons 1320° °
in parliament, for the 6th of October. It was well attended, but
Lancaster, as usual, absented himself, and sent Nicolas Segrave as
his proxy.1 The session was not a quiet one. Although we do not
know that the question about Gower was mooted in it, the estates
refused to confirm grants which the king had made to the pope's
relations, and petitioned for a severe inquiry by the justices into the
unlawful confederations for breach of the peace which were doing
mischief in every county.2 The session ended on the 25th of
October, and on the 18th of December commissions of oyer and
terminer were issued in compliance with the parliamentary petition.
On the 14th of January, 1821 the justices itinerant at the Tower
were directed to examine into unlawful ' colligations, confederations,
and conventions by oaths ' which were known to have been formed
in the city.3 The disturbed state of Glamorganshire was now Disturbed
known : on the 20th the king directed a special commission for the ^we"f
apprehension of malefactors in Gower,4 and on the 30th wrote to
the earls of Hereford, Arundel, and Warenne, forbidding them
to attend an illegal gathering which had been summoned to
treat of matters touching the Crown.5 The same day the sheriffs
of the northern counties were ordered to warn all men against
attending unlawful meetings. It is clear, therefore, that the king
knew what the matter in contention was, who were the chief com-
batants, and from what quarter they looked for assistance. As
the season advanced, and matters grew more threatening, Edward
prepared to go westward. He reached Gloucester late in March, The king m
and on the 28th wrote to the lord Hastings, the earl of Hereford, M^rciTissi
the two Kogers of Mortimer, the younger Despenser, John Giffard
of Brimsfield, and Thomas and Maurice of Berkeley ; all of
them men whose names have an unhappy prominence in the
later records of the reign. He has heard, he tells them, that
there is war on the March ; they must come to a council at Gloucester
on the 5th of April.6 Two days later the king seems to have fixed Proceedings
on Hugh of Audley as the chief delinquent ; he was specially bound H^ifof
to the king by covenant ; he had again and again refused to obey Rope?y a'Kl
the royal summons. He was now peremptorily ordered to appear, D'Amory

1 Ann. Paul. i. 290. 2 Foedera, ii. 438 ; Rot Parl. i. 371.

3 Fcedera, ii. 441 ; Ann. Paul. i. 290, 291 ; Parl. Writs, II. ii. 154, 155.

4 Parl. Writs, II. ii. 155. s Ibid.
6 Ibid. II. i. 231.

512

CHRONICLES OF THE REIGNS OF

Edward (all*
to make

returns to
London

Tin' lands
of the
Uespensers
ravaged

Lancaster
assembles
his allies at
Pomfret,
May 84

and the Earl Marshall and Justice Spiguroel were to try him.1 The
other confederates, who had ventured to write to urge the king to dis-
miss Despenser, or place him in the hands of Lancaster, were Roger
D'Amory, John Mowbray, Roger Clifford, and the earl of Hereford.
On the 9th of April the sentence of forfeiture was issued against
Audley,1 and about the same date the king seized the castle of 8.
Briavel, which belonged to Roger D'Amory, whom he had warned
by a letter of the 27th March.3 On the 21st of April he was at
Bristol, whence he again wrote to warn the Berkeleys and sixty-two
other great lords ; 4 two days after this he set out on his return to
London. He had failed to quiet the disturbance, and probably was
unable to muster a force that could overawe the discontented. Before
leaving Bristol, however, he wrote to the earl of Hereford, who
was his brother-in-law, remonstrating with him for his disobedience
in not attending the council, arguing that, as Hugh le Despenser
was appointed chamberlain by the parliament, he could not properly
dismiss him, and to commit him to custody would be contrary to
the Great Charter, the common law of the kingdom, the Ordinances,
and the coronation oath. The letter, which is sufficiently dignified,
ended with a summons to council at Oxford oh the 10th of May.*
When the king reached Wallingford he issued other letters ; the
council was postponed to the 17th, and Hereford and Despenser
were both forbidden to continue their private war.6 As soon, in
fact, as Edward had turned eastward the confederates had overrun
all Despenser's estates in Wales.7 Hugh himself was believed to be
in attendance on the king. On the 15th of May the summons was
issued for the meeting of parliament on the 15th of July.8

The hand of Lancaster, the Malmesbury writer tells us,9 was in
all ibis ; but he had not stirred overtly. His enemy was the elder
Hugh, not the younger. It is to the Bridlington annalist that we
owe our most exact information about the part which the great earl
was now about to take.10 On the 24th of May, as soon, that is, as
the parliamentary summons was received, he called together at his
castle of Pomfret the great lords of the north country, Multon of
Gilsland, Furnivall of Sheffield, the baron of Greystoke, the Deyn-
cburts, Fitzhugh of Middle-hum, Percy of Topcliffe, Marmion of
Tanfield, Philip Darcy, William Fitz-William, Fauconberg, Meynell,

1 Parl. Writs, II. ii. 158.

Ibid.

Mon. Malmesb. p. 246 ; Foedera,
ii. 445. ' Parl. Writs, II. ii. 160.

Ibid. II. i. 231.

Ibid. II. ii. 161.

They began to ravage the es-
tates of the son on the 6th of May ;
the attack on the father began in

Wiltshire on June llth, i.e. after
Lancaster had declared himself.
These dates are given in the petition
for the restoration of the Despenserc
in 1398, from the petition of 1322:
Rot. Parl. III. 361, 362.

• Parl. Writs, II. i. 234.

• See vol. in B. 8. p. 267.
18 See vol. in B. S. p. 61.

EDWARD I. AND EDWARD II. 513

Thwing, and Constable ; all these, for themselves and their retainers, A confedera-
agreed on a league of defence ; if anyone attacked the earl or any of up!anaaw
the league, all would join to punish the aggressor and to secure the Sl
peace. The covenant, which was written in French, was sealed by
each of the lords.

So far, perhaps, the earl had gone no further than the usage Legality
of the time, however illegal and unconstitutional, warranted ; he °
had as much right to make an alliance, offensive and defensive, as
Badlesmere and D'Amory had had in 1817. The covenant which other
the king himself had made with Hugh of Audley was distinctly a
party or personal covenant superadded on the feudal relation, or on
the right of the king to the allegiance of his subject. Hugh le
Despenser, as we learn from Dugdale,1 had a similar covenant with
the earl of Louth, and it was by an attempt to draw in John Giffard
to such a confederation that he laid himself open to the charge on
which the first article of his condemnation was framed.2 But the
earl's next proceeding was very strange. He summoned the arch- Lancaster
bishop of York, the bishops of Durham and Carlisle, and the other tbTciergy
prelates of the province to meet at Sherburn in Elmet, on the 28th f^ Eimst""'
of June ; 3 and at the same time invited the chief of the malcontent Juue 2:
lords, who had been harrying the estates of the Despensers, to meet
them. In a word, he tried to bring together a parliament of his '
own, prelates, barons, bannerets, and knights.

At Sherburn, then, which is a village about halfway between Lancaster's
Pomfret and Tadcaster, dignified as being a very ancient residence at Sherburn
of the archbishops, a very extraordinary assembly met. There was
Archbishop Melton, who throughout his life was a faithful friend of
the king, Bishop Lewis of Durham, brother of Edward's favourite
Henry Beaumont, and the old Bishop Halton of Carlisle, who had
lived in alarms from the Scots for thirty years. What could have
induced Melton to attend, unless it was the hope of being able to
mediate, it is impossible to say ; perhaps he felt that he could not
trust the king, and that it was not wise to disappoint the earl ; he
certainly came and brought a considerable quota of his clergy with
him. With Lancaster appeared the earls of Hereford and Angus,
and a goodly number of lay lords of north and south, who were pre-
pared to cast in their lot with them. They met in the parish
church, and the proceedings opened as in parliament by the reading
of articles at the earl's command. The articles were in French and
included the agreement concluded at Pomfret in the preceding
month, with a statement of grievances to be discussed and if possible statement of
provided with remedies. The grievances were the bad ministers Bnev!U"

1 Baronage, p. 391. 2 Statutes of the Realm, i. 182.

3 Bridlington, vol. in R. S. p. 62.

L L

514

CHRONICLES OF THE REIGNS OF

Separate de-
liberation

Indenture of
confedera-
tion

The elder
DaqMBMt
KttMkad

Answer of
the clergy
after de-
liberation

who were appointed contrary to the Ordinances ; the banishments
and forfeitures which had been decreed without assent of peers ; the
visitation of the special commissions for putting down conspiracies ;
the action of the justices itinerant at London on the writ Quo
warranto ; the abuses of the staple, and the imprudent treaties
made with foreign nations. It was also declared that the king had
too many lawyers about him, so many in fact that the persons whom
the court wanted to implead had the greatest difficulty in finding
advocates to undertake their causes.1 This bill of articles having
been read by Sir John de Bek, acting as chancellor to the almost
sovereign earl, the earl himself requested the prelates to retire and
consider their answers. They left the church and held their quasi -
convocation at the house of the rector. Lancaster and the lords
deliberated apart. The result of the consultation was, in the
chamber of the lords, a determination to adhere to Lancaster and to
maintain the quarrel of the earl of Hereford and his confederates
against the Despensers. This was drawn in an indenture in which
were inserted the names of the earls of Lancaster and Angus and
thirty-three men of rank, including some of the confederates of
Pomfret, and among them Sir Robert of Holland, the trusted friend
of Lancaster, who afterwards betrayed the good cause, and Sir
William Trussell, who took the leading part four years afterwards in
the deposition of the king.2 It was by the influence of Lancaster
that the elder Hugh le Despenser was included in the accusations
prosecuted against his son ; and in all probability the act of con-
demnation, which was passed a month after in the real parliament,
may have been drawn up on this occasion.

After the lords had deliberated the clergy sent in their reply,
addressed to the earl as ' domine reverende.' 3 They expressed their
sincere gratitude to the earl for the heartfelt anxiety he showed for
the kingdom and country, and declared themselves willing to the
utmost of their ability to join in the defence against the Scots. But
further than that they were not disposed to go : as to the ' motions
of late set on foot ' (that is, the political quarrel), ' they humbly and
devoutly supplicate your reverend lordship and the others in company
with you, that for reverence and honour of God and holy church, the
salvation of the realm and the quiet of the people, there be a tolerance
or forbearance of the said motions ' (that is a suspension of hostilities),
1 and that in the next parliament concord and unity may be ordained
between our lord the king and his lieges by peaceful considerations
in Christ as to what is most expedient. And if this be done they
trust that upon all the articles here exhibited, by the favour of God,

1 Bridlington, vol. in R. 8. pp. 62-64.

2 See the indenture printed in

Tyrrell, iii. 280.

1 Bridlington, vol. in R. 8. pp. 64, 63.

EDWARD I. AND EDWARD II. 515

an opportune remedy will be ordained in the said parliament.' The Policy of
answer was a good one, creditable to the religious spirit of the clergy,
and a clever one, foiling the earl for a moment with his own weapon,
and recommending confidence in parliament. Nor is the freedom
with which it is given less creditable to the earl, who evidently
might have extorted stronger expressions and promises of support.
c This answer in writing having been read before the earl, he in right
royal fashion returned special thanks to the prelates and clergy, and
so having received licence to depart all retired.'

It is to the Bridlington annalist that we owe the most striking of Tyrreirs
these details, but it is most probable that either in the public records, these pro-
or in some of the episcopal registries, even a fuller account may be
preserved. Tyrrell, in his History of England, has preserved a copy
of the indenture, from the register of Christ Church, Canterbury,
and some of the particulars are referred to in the proceedings for
setting aside the exile of the Despensers. But Tyrrell placed
Sherburn1 in Dorsetshire, a mistake corrected by Carte, who, however,
extracted his list of the confederates from Tyrrell's work.2 It is
curious that Walsingham, who knew of the Sherburn gathering, but
did not know where Elmet was, wrote the name so that of his editors
one read Clivedon, and the other Elmedon.3 In the popular histories
of the epoch scarcely a word is found that shows any knowledge of
this most curious and important episode of the struggle.

Our authorities do not, I think, furnish us with any new details N° material
of the parliamentary proceedings against the Despensers, or of the our mforma-
war which followed, over and above the anecdote of the younger island
Hugh which is preserved by the canon of Bridlington.4 Nor do the 132G
few particulars recorded of the king's flight from Byland to Bridling-
ton in 1822,5 although interesting in themselves, add anything
important to our knowledge of the period. The dreary years of the
Despenser government from 1822 to 1826 are unbroken by any ray
of political light or poetical incident. And even when we reach the
great crisis at the end of the latter year, we have to contend with a
dearth of such minute detail as would give life or reality to any
picture we might attempt to draw. As, however, in the preface to
the first volume,6 1 undertook to devote a few pages to an attempt
to arrange the chronology and determine some of the local features
of the revolution, at least in London, I will endeavour, with the aid
of the Pauline Annals and such other materials as are within reach,
to fulfil the promise.

Edward, it may be remembered, had been very much isolated

1 Hist, of England, iii. 279. 4 Vol. in R. S. p. xxx.

2 Carte, Hist. Engl. ii. 5 Ibid. pp. 79 sq.

3 Walsingham, ed. Riley, i. 159. 6 Vol. i. p. Ixxxv, R. S.

L L 2

516

CHRONICLES OF THE REIGNS OF

Condition ol
affair* In
1316

Edward
unable to
grasp at
power when
he had a
chance

The position
of Henry of
Leicester

since his tragic victory over Earl Thomas. He had lost his faithful
friend and cousin, Earl Aymer of Pembroke in 1824 ; he had sent
the queen, his brother the earl of Kent, and his son Edward to
France in 1825 ; the Earl Warenne, who had been for two years in
command in Gascony, had only just returned, and at no time had
he shown himself a wise counsellor. Henry of Lancaster, now
known as earl of Leicester, was a man of noble character, but Edward
might well distrust him, as having his brother's wrongs to avenge,
and a claim, as yet unsatisfied, on his brother's inheritance. The
earls of Hereford and Warwick were minors, and so in a position in
which the king could not obtain help from them as friends, nor
strengthen himself by destroying them. The earl of Arundel was
faithful, but carried little weight ; all the will and executive force of
the government depended on the Despensers. The chancellor
Baldock shared the unpopularity of the court, and Archbishop
Melton, the treasurer, who was faithful and not unpopular, had his
means of usefulness curtailed by the watchful enmity of the weak
and ungenerous primate at Canterbury.1 The leading men of the
episcopal body were men who had forced themselves upon the king
by means of papal intrigue or usurpation, and who attributed their
loss of influence at court to the hostility of Baldock, whom they
had supplanted in the way of preferment, or to the Despensers. who
had kept them out of their temporalities on legal pretexts. With his
kinsmen alienated, his great nobles in minority or retirement, his
bishops untrustworthy, and his ministers unpopular, a really able
king could scarcely have failed to strengthen himself by alliance
with such strong political elements as were to be found in the cities
and in the country party which in the next reign showed itself so
strong. There is indeed some evidence that Edward had tried to
propitiate the Londoners,2 and we can scarcely think that the Despen-
sers had so entirely lost their heads as not to have attempted to
create a party of personal adherents. But the result shows that if
they had done so the attempt had failed. The earl of Leicester was
son-in-law of the Lady Despenser, and may have hoped by using the
family connexion wisely to obtain recognition as his brother's
successor ; but in all these family ties at this period of history we find
causes and occasions of enmity quite as often as of friendship ; nor
could Leicester be expected to forget that the father and son were
really responsible for the death of his brother. He had a party in
the great and mighty host of vassals which since the battle of Eves-
ham had rallied round the banners of Leicester, Lancaster, Derby,
and Lincoln. The new-made earls of Winchester and Gloucester

1 Mon. Malmesb. vol. in R. S. p. '283.

Walsingbam, i. 180.

EDWAKD I. AND EDWARD II. 517

had none. Their sole source of strength seems to have been their Heipie
hold on the person and will of their master, and their ability to use
the little influence that still remained to him after he had lost his
wife and son, sacrificed his relations to his revenge, and signally
failed at Bannockburn, at Byland, and at Berwick to prove that he
inherited his father's prowess. It was this helplessness and isola-
tion that ruined him ; for, though the queen's invasion was cleverly
managed, and the boldness and promptitude with which her
advisers acted might, so far as adroitness deserves success, have been
fairly entitled to some great advantage, she had no great force nor
any sound political cry. No one believed in her alleged wrongs, but
she gained a following as the avenger of the earl who was more
honoured in his death than in his life. She won a great victory, Easy victory
but it was over a foe that put in no appearance, without a battle, quee'n
but not without wanton and cruel bloodshed, prolific of quarrels,
vengeances, and further bloodshed for long years to come.

All through the summer there had been rumours of an invasion ; Alarm of
the king had not been put off his guard by his knowledge of the very u
small resources that were at his wife's disposal. He had been
nervously alive to the danger, all the more as it was for long alto-
gether uncertain on what side it was likely to come. After spending Movements
the spring at Kenilworth, and June and July in London, he had
gone in August to Clarendon,1 where he had in former years spent
so much time in laying out his park and improving his forest
domain, and had in September been at Porchester issuing writs of
array and taking other precautions. In this month he was informed
where the queen was likely to land, and on the 2nd 2 directed the
march of forces to Orwell, where in fact she did land three weeks
later. On the 23rd of September he was in London, and there the
news that she had landed on the 24th reached him on the 27th.3 The queen
She had landed at noon near Harwich, at Colvasse, and lodged the
first night at Walton.4 She had ten ships, and the disembarkation was
so rapidly effected that nine of them were cleared before sunset, the
tenth was brought by the king's sailors to London, and, with the news
of his wife's arrival, presented to him at the Tower.5 He remained flight °f
in London for a few days longer, was at Westminster on the 2nd of
October, and on that day set out for the west,6 leaving in the Tower
his son John of Eltham, a mere child, as nominal governor, with
Sir John Weston the constable.7 Isabella marched towards London,

1 Parl. Writs, II. Chronological 5 Ibid. p. 314.

Abstract, pp. 439-448. 6 Parl. Writs, II. ii. 294. Ed-

* Parl. Writs, II. i. 758. ward was at the Tower on the 28th

3 Ibid. II. ii. 292. of September.

4 Ann. Paul. i. 313, 314. 7 Walsingham, i. 183.

518

CHRONICLES OF THE REIGNS OF

She reaches
Bristol

Retreat of
the king

The king's
movements
in his flight

expecting to find her husband still there, and being joined by all
classes as she proceeded. At Bury St. Edmund's she borrowed 800
marks of the king's money deposited in the abbey ; 1 she went on to
Cambridge and stayed a day or two at Barnwell,2 then to Baldock
in Hertfordshire,3 where she enjoyed the pleasure of plundering the
chancellor's property, and then to Dunstable.4 At Dunstable the
earl of Leicester joined her.5 On the way she must have heard that
Edward had left London. She then turned westward and passed on
to Oxford, where she laid her cause before the University in a sermon
preached by Bishop Orlton, on the text ' Caput meum doleo.' 6
From Oxford she went to Wallingford,7 where she was on the 15th of
October ; thence to Gloucester, where she was joined by Percy, Wake,
and other northern lords ; 8 thence to Berkeley, where she secured
the allegiance of the heir of the castle by restoring to him the estate
which Hugh le Despenser had seized on the ground probably of his
father's treason.9 From Berkeley she went on with a constantly
increasing host of retainers to Bristol, where on the 26th of October
the carnage of the revolution began.

Helpless and unready the unhappy king, with his chancellor
Baldock, the younger Despenser, and a few other followers, started
from London on the 2nd of October. On the 10th he was at
Gloucester,10 still issuing letters of summons for the men of the
districts nearest, especially those of South Wales. He had, if we
may trust Sir Thomas de la Moore,11 sent a quantity of supplies
to Lundy Island, which he regarded as a last refuge. But,
although he may before the last extremity arrived have thought of
Lundy as a place of security, we can hardly think that either
despairing foresight or simple cowardice was so strong in him as
to suffer him to provide himself with such a resource long before.
Anyhow he made for the Severn ; on the 12th of October he was
at Westbury,12 on the 14th at Tintern ; l3 and from the 16th to the
21st at Stroguil or Chepstow,14 whence he sent the elder Despenser
to take the command at Bristol. There the old counsellor of Edward
I., the son of Simon de Montfort's justiciar, fell into the hands of
his enemies and gave his life in expiation of the wrongs of
Lancaster.15

1 Ann. Paul. i. 314.

1 Ibid. • Ibid.

4 Ann. Paul. i. 315.

5 Knighton, c. 2546.

• T. de la Moore ; see vol. in R. S.
p. 310.

7 Fcedera, ii. 645, 046; Twysden,
Scriptores, c. 2764.

• Walsingham, i. 183.

• Ibid.

• Parl. Writs, II. ii. 294, 295.

1 See vol. in R. S. p. 309 ; Walsing-
ham, i. 183.

* Parl. Writs, II. i. 760.
1 Ibid. II. ii. 295.

4 Ibid. II. i. 761; Walsingham,
i. 181.

11 Compare Ann. Paul. i. 317, 318 ;
Wals. i. 183; Knighton, c. 2544:
Bridlington, vol. in R. S. p. 87.

EDWARD I. AND EDWARD II. 519

We lose sight of the king between October 21st, when he was at
Chepstow,1 and October 27th, when we find him at Cardiff ; 2 and it
is to the intervening days that we must assign the unsuccessful Attempt
attempt to reach Lundy Island. Unable to effect a landing, he is Lmuiy
said to have disembarked in Glamorganshire.3 From Cardiff on
the 27th and 28th he sent out letters, for he still had the chancellor The ki»-.

at Cardiff,

and the great seal with him, to bring in the men of the neighbour- caerphuiy,
ing lordships. At Caerphilly, where the third and youngest Despenser
was in command, on the 29th and 30th he issued commissions of
array for the same districts.4 Again we lose sight of him for
nearly a week. He is found at Neath on the 5th of November, still
entreating aid from the men of Gower.5 The end was now very
near. The queen knew where to find her husband, for, as he had
made no secret of his residence at Neath, it is needless to suppose that
treachery was at work. Which of the parties opened the negotia- Negotiation
tions that ended in surrender it is impossible to say. On the 10th kLg^aur-
of November, however, the abbot of Neath, Rhys ap Griffith, and r
Edward Bohun, had letters of safe-conduct from the king as his
messengers to his wife and son.6 On the 16th he was taken at Capture of
Llantrissaint,7 having apparently made no attempt to save his friends, execution of
a fact which may seem to prove that the whole party were taken
by surprise. Henry of Lancaster and Rhys ap Howel made the
capture, and the prisoners, with the great seal, were delivered to the
queen at Hereford on the 20th. The earl of Arundel, who was taken
at Shrewsbury by John Charlton, was beheaded on the 17th,8 and
Hugh le Despenser en the 24th.

We must, however, now turn back to London, which the king state of
had quitted at the beginning of October, leaving his son John of
Eltham and his niece the countess of Gloucester in the Tower. The
city was, as usual, divided in opinion. Hamo of Chigwell had been
maintained by royal influence in the mayoralty for three years in
succession,9 but Nicolas of Farringdon, the head of the rival party,
was nearly as strong, and much stronger when it was known that
the tide had turned. Before Edward left London Hamo had failed Hamo of
to get from the citizens a promise to shut out the queen, although the "mayor
they would undertake to shutout the foreigners ; 10 as soon as it was
known that the queen's cause was prevailing he lost his power

1 Parl. Writs, II. ii. 290. " Fcedera, ii. 647.

- Ibid. II. i. 761. 7 Lantrosin, Ann. Paul. i. 319 ;

3 T. de la Moore ; see vol. in R. S. Laturssan, Wals. i. 184.

p. 309 Walsingham, i. 183. * Bridlington, vol. in R. S. p. 87.

4 Fcedera, ii. 646, 647 ; Parl. Writs, 9 See vol. i. pp. Ixxxii. sq. R. S.
II. i. 760-762 ; Walsingham, i. 183, French Chronicle of London, pp. 42.
184. 48, 49, 51.

5 Parl. Writs, II. i. 763. '° Walsingham, i. 180.

520

CHRONICLES OF THE REIGNS OF

Communica-
tions from
the queen

Conduct of
Archbishop
Reynolds

Assembly of
bishops at
Lambeth

Proposed
meeting at
S. Paul's

Proposed
mission of
mediation

Proposed
ftewion at
Blackfriars

altogether. The queen had lost no time before asking the aid of the
citizens. Her letters had been sent out on the 29th of September,1
but so long as the king was in the neighbourhood the receipt of them
was kept secret.2 On the 9th of October another letter was found
at the dawn of day posted on the cross in Cheap,3 praying the faith-
ful Londoners to join in destroying the enemies of the land, especially
Hugh le Despenser. The city was troubled, but remained quiet for
nearly a week. There was a strong force of bishops in the neigh-
bourhood, and with their counsel the mayor was able to keep peace.
On the 18th, the Monday after the letter was published,4 the poor
foolish archbishop, who on the 80th of September had tried to
delude the people by publishing at S. Paul's an old Bull against the
Scots as if it had been directed against the queen,5 got together at
Lambeth the bishop of London, Stephen of Gravesend, Hamo of
Hythe, bishop of Rochester, and Bishop Cobham of Worcester, who
were all three pious learned men, but not statesmen ; Bishop
Stapleton of Exeter, who had been treasurer when the queen's
estates were seized, and who was only less unpopular than the
chancellor ; and Bishop Stratford of Winchester, who was probably
committed already to the queen, and who later on was the head of the
Lancaster party in the new government.6 The archbishop proposed
to hold a meeting at S. Paul's, preparatory to sending a mission of
mediation ; but the bishop of Rochester strongly advised him not to
cross the river or attempt to enter the city. The more cautious
counsels prevailed, and the debate was postponed to the Tuesday.
Then again the prelates met at Lambeth. A mission should be
sent, but who would go ? Bishop Stratford was willing to go — he
knew that he was safe — but only if he had a companion ; all declined
for themselves and pressed the bishop of Rochester to go. He
resolutely excused himself. In fact it was now too late. He
returned to Rochester Place, near the archbishop's palace ; Stratford
to his house in Southwark, and the bishops of London and Exeter
to their respective lodgings ; Bishop Gravesend probably to his house
by S. Paul's, and Bishop Stapleton either to the mansion which he
was building on the site of the Outer Temple or to the house in Old
Dean's Lane close to where Stationers' Hall and Amen Court now
stand, and not far from Chancellor Baldock's house of canonical
residence in Ivy Lane. The bishops of London and Exeter were to
meet the next morning at Blackfriars with the judges, possibly to
contrive means for securing the city.7

1 French Chronicle, p. 51. had been duly applied for and was

* Ibid. » Ibid. intended by the pope for this purpose.
4 W. Dene, Ang. Sac. i. 366. • W. Dene, Ang. Sac. i. 366.

* Ann. Paul. i. 815. Knighton, ' Ibid. ; cf. Leland, Collectanea,
c. 2544, writes as if the Bull so used i. 467.

EDWAKD I. AND EDWAKD II. 521

On the 15th of October the city broke into rebellion.1 The Rising m
mayor and aldermen had gone out early to Blackfriars to meet the
bishops ; they were recalled by a rising of the citizens, who forced
them to the Guildhall, the mayor Hamo imploring mercy with
clasped hands, and only able to save himself by granting to the
' commune ' all that they asked, and especially undertaking to drive
out of the city all enemies of the queen.2 One unfortunate man, Murder of
John le Marchal, a citizen who was regarded as a spy of the De- Marchai
spensers, was caught in his inn in Walbrook, dragged into Cheap,
stripped and beheaded.3 Just at this time the unfortunate Bishop Perilous
Stapleton, who had been visiting his new house outside Temple Bishop
Bar, came riding into the city with two of his squires, William
Wall, who was his nephew,4 and John of Padington, the latter being
steward of the new mansion. The mob, which seems to have been
disappointed not to find him at Blackfriars, was on the watch for
him ; and it was believed also that he intended to claim the charge
of the city at the Guildhall. He entered the city by Newgate, and,
on his way to the Tower, was to stay in Old Dean's Lane to take
his noonday meal.6 He had reached the church of S. Michael le
Quern, which stood at the west end of Cheapside, near the cross.
Hearing the cries of ' Traitor ! traitor ! ' he turned his horse and
attempted to reach S. Paul's ; but at the north door he was seized,
dismounted, and dragged into the Cheap, through the middle of
S. Paul's churchyard,6 and there stripped and beheaded with a Heismur-
panade 7 or butcher's knife which one of the bystanders offered, by s. Paul's
a certain E. de Hatfield.8 The bishop's two squires perished with
him. His body was left on the spot until evening ; his head was set
on the pillory9 and afterwards sent to the queen at Bristol.10 His
house had been already plundered, and seems to have given the rioters
their first taste of spoil as well as of violence ; for before order was Plunder ami

devastation

restored the chancellor's houses in Ivy Lane and Finsbury were in London
destroyed ; l ' the treasure of the unfortunate earl of Arundel,
deposited at Trinity, Aldgate, was seized ; 12 the chancellor's treasure
at S. Paul's shared the same fate ; and the banking-house of the

1 Ann. Paul. i. 315. 10 It is said that the queen re-

2 French Chronicle, p. 52. ceived the head from the mayor,

3 Ann. Paul. i. 315, 316 ; French Hamo of Chigwell, and thanked him
Chronicle, p. 52. for it, adding that it was an excellent

4 Leland, Coll. i. 463. piece of justice. It is very impro-

5 Ann. Paul. i. 316 ; W. Dene, bable that Hamo did this, as he was
Ang. Sac. i. 366 ; French Chronicle, very shortly removed from office,
p. 52. See Aungier's note, French Chronicle,

6 Ann. Paul. i. 316. p. 53.

7 Ibid. i. 350. " French Chronicle, pp. 53, 54.

8 Ibid. i. 345. ™ Ann. Paul. i. 321.

9 W. Dene, Ang. Sac. i. 366.

522

CHRONICLES OF THE REIGNS OF

I-' :nrr..

ritMof
BUhop

Staple ton

Ismomiuioiis
treatment
of bis body

Flight of
the other
bishops

Adventures
of the
bishop of
Rochester

Bardi, where the Despensers' treasures were, was despoiled in the
night. Other houses of rich citizens were likewise robbed.

In the evening, after vespers, the minor canons and vicars choral
of 8. Paul's took courage and came with cross before them and
took up the bishop's body. It remained in the church all night,
and in the morning was carried to S. Clement Danes, a church
standing near the bishop's new mansion, the advowson of which he
had lately procured from the brethren of the Holy Sepulchre at
Warwick by an exchange for Snitterfield, in Warwickshire.1 The
tumult had not yet subsided ; the bishop's treasurer was killed
the same morning at Holywell, close to the church,3 and the
cowardly rector, John Mugg, refused to admit the mutilated corpse
of his patron. The bearers were told that the bishop had died under
sentence of excommunication,3 and they fled. There stood then
near S. Clement's an old deserted and half-ruined church of the
Holy Innocents, with a cemetery that had once belonged to the Pied
Friars, a small order of mendicants which had been suppressed in
1273. Stapleton, it was said, had applied some of the materials
of this church to the building of his new house ;4 if it were so, the
treatment of his lifeless body was a fearful example of the punish-
ment of sacrilege. Covered with a ragged cloth, it was deposited,
without service of priest or clerk, without the trouble of digging a
grave, in a hole among the ruins ;' there it remained until on the
17th of February, when the court was becoming ashamed of the
outrages of the revolution, it was disinterred and taken to Exeter.6

The primate and his brethren may well be excused for taking
timely measures to secure themselves. The noise in London on the
morning of the 15th was so loud as to reach the bishop of Kochester
as he sat at dinner in his house at Lambeth, and he immediately
sent to his great neighbour to learn what had happened. Arch-
bishop Reynolds had not only decamped, but had borrowed the
bishop's horses and gone off to Kent without giving him warning.
Poor Bishop Hamo started off on foot to Lesnes, where he stayed all
night ; the next day he got some food at Stone, and went on to
Hailing. There he was told that the road to Rochester was unsafe,
at all events for a bishop who was reckoned rich ; he therefore took

1 Ann. Paul. i. 316 ; French Chron.
p. 52 ; Leland, Collectanea, i. 468.

s French Chronicle, p. 53, note.

1 French Chronicle, p. 52 ; cf. Wal-
singham, i. 182.

4 Leland, Collectanea, i. 468.

5 Ann. Paul. i. 316 ; French Chron.
p. 52.

* The Annales Paulini (p. 317) give
the date of the transfer; Dr. Oliver

(Exeter Cathedral, pp. 63, 68) doubts
whether it was really made, as the
executors' accounts do not mention
it. But if it was done in consequence
of a royal command, the king may
have paid for it. See Boase's Register
of Exeter College, pref. pp. ii. 3,
where March 28 is mentioned as the
date of burial at Exeter.

EDWARD I. AND EDWARD II. 528

boat as far as Boxley. Next morning, having breakfasted at the
abbot's grange, he got a horse and rode into Kochester, where he
stayed a week, and on All Saints' day entertained the bettermost folk
of the neighbourhood at his table. After dinner he went to Hailing,
but the populace who had not been invited to the feast assembled at
the church and were with difficulty prevented from plundering.1
The trouble had by this time extended far beyond London, and the
example set there of opening the prisons and releasing criminals Release of

criminals

had filled the country towns with malefactors.2

It is not certain that until the king was captured the weaker party The arcu-
among the bishops sent in their submission to the queen. Some t^quee!}113
of them had sent her money, and some, like Bishop Hamo, had
sent excuses for non-appearance when she was at Gloucester.3 But
it was not until the 7th of December that the archbishop at
Maidstone made up his mind to desert his old pupil and indulgent
lord. The bishop of Rochester tried to dissuade him and refused to Progress of
go with him, but he feared the queen more than the King of Heaven, n0eurev
and went to join her at Wallingford, where Bishop Stratford was
already framing the articles which would justify the deposition of
the king.4 The rest of the revolutionary programme was carried
through in the parliament of January 1327. The archbishop of
York, with the bishops of Rochester, Carlisle, and London, attempted
a slight obstruction, but it was of course in vain. The archbishop
of Canterbury, although now numbered in the victorious party,
narrowly escaped ill-treatment at the Guildhall, the Londoners who
flocked together ' to see the bishops sacrifice to Mahomet ' 5 appa-
rently thinking that cowardice and ingratitude constituted no
particular title to respect, although they accepted fifty casks of wine
in token of reconciliation.6

The details of the insults and tortures inflicted on the miserable Narrative of
king, from the day of his capture in November 1326 to his death in deria ji'oore
1827, are known to us chiefly through the narrative of Sir Thomas
de la Moore, and, being recorded full twenty years after the event,
are susceptible of some criticism, if any conflicting statements can
be brought against them. A conspiracy for a restoration was
detected in June,7 which probably alarmed the queen and her ad-
visers into more cruel proceedings. On these the other contemporary
writers throw little light ; they must indeed have been secrets at the
time and as long as Mortimer lived. We learn from Bishop Chiton's

1 W. Dene, Ang. Sac. i. 366, 367. 5 W. Dene, Ang. Sac. i. 367.

2 Walsingkam, i. 183. 6 French Chron. p. 58; W. Dene,

3 W. Dene, Ang. Sac. i. 367. Ang. Sac. i. 367 ; Ann. Paul. i.

4 W. Dene, Ang. Sac. i. 367; 323.

Knighton, c. 27(54, 2765. " Ann. Paul. i. 337.

CHKONICI^ES OF THE REIGNS OF

Questions
M to Hd-
ward'f 1m-
prisouinent

Secrecy of
tbe king's
murder

Letter of
Fieecbi on
tbe king's
escape

defence that when in the spring of 1827 he went to Avignon '
Edward was still at Kenilworth in the charge of the earl of Lancaster.
The date of his removal to Berkeley is given as the 8rd of April.2
Sir Thomas mentions a period of imprisonment at Corfe Castle and
at Bristol between his leaving Kenilworth and arriving at Berkeley,
and tells of the miserable incident of the king being shaven with
ditch water as having happened in the marshes of the Severn between
Bristol and Berkeley.3 Such at least was the story that William
Bishop, who had been one of the escort, told him after the great
plague of 1849, twenty-three years after it had happened.4 According
to the Peterhouse Chronicle, as abridged by Leland, it was at Corfe
that Gourney and Maltravers received the order to put the king to
death. The exact mode of the murder is mentioned by the same
writer, and appears in the Polychronicon, which must have been
finished long before De la Moore wrote.5

It is not to be wondered that, as the whole treatment of the
king was secret, there should be a great mystery about his end. He
was indeed buried at Gloucester with sufficient pomp, but there
were suspicious, ' marvellous ' circumstances about the whole matter.''
In 1828 Edmund of Kent, his penitent half-brother, was prevailed
on to believe that he was living on the continent. Mortimer, it
was inferred, had contrived the letters that induced him to take
measures which were construed as treason. A few years ago there
was discovered among the archives of the department of H6rault a
letter from Manuel Fieschi to Edward III. purporting to contain
the confession of Edward II. after his escape from Berkeley, and
certain mysterious adventures which had ended in his finding a
resting-place in Italy. The letter is curiously accurate in the
character of its details, and contains no anachronism or inconsistent
statements by which its falsehood could be distinctly proved. I am
indebted for my acquaintance with it to two articles published by
Mr. Bent in ' Macmillan's Magazine ' and in ' Notes and Queries ' for
the year 1880. It is printed from the original in No. 87 of the
Publications de la Soci6t6 Arch^ologique de Montpellier (December
1877), with a translation and notes by M. A. Germain.

' In nomine Domini Amen. Ea quae audivi ex confessione
patris vestri, manu propria scripsi, et propterea ad vestri domina-
tionem intimari curavi. Primo dicit quod sentiens Angliam in

1 Twysden, Scriptores, c. 2766.
Orlton had letters of credence to the
pope on the 24th of March ; Foedera,
ii. 698, 699.

2 Walsingham, i. 188; Knighton,
c. 2551 ; Mon. Malmesb. from the
Polychronicon ; vol. in K. 8. p. 290.

* See vol. in B. S. p. 816.
4 Ibid. p. 317.

4 See Polychr. (ed. Lumby), viii.
324; Knighton, o. 2652; Walsing-
harn, i. 189.

• Leland, Coll. i. 469.

EDWARD I. AND EDWARD II. 525

subversions contra ipsum, propterea monitu matris vestraa recessit a

familia sua in castro comitis Marescali supra mare quod vocatur The retreat

Gesosta. Postea timore ductus ascendit barcham unam com dominis

Ugone Dispensario et comiti Arundele et aliquibus aliis et aplicuit landing in

in Glamorgan supra mare, et ibi fuit captus, una com domino dicto

Ugone et magistro Roberto de Baldoli ; et f uerunt capti per dominum

Henricum de Longo Castello ; et duxerunt ipsum in castro Cbilon- surrender

gurda, et alii fuerunt alibi ad loca diversa ; et ibi perdidit coronam tivityap

ad requisitionem multorum. Postea subsequenter fuistis coronatus

in proximiori festo Sanctse Mariae de la Candelor. Ultimum miserunt

eum ad castrum de Berchele. Postea famulus qui custodiebat ipsum

post aliqua tempora dixit patri vestro : Domine, dominus Thomas Arrival of

CrOurii6Y

de Gornay et dominus Symon d'Esberfort milites venerunt causa andBerford
interficiendi vos ; si placet, dabo vobis raubas meas ut melius evadere ticking
possitis. Tune condictis raubis hora quasi noctis exivit carcerem,
et dum pervenisset usque ad ultimurn ostium sine resistentia, quia
non cognoscebatur, invenit ostiarium dormientem, quern subito
interfecit ; et receptis clavibus ostii, aperuit ostium, et exivit, et
custos suus qui eum custodiebat. Videntes dicti milites qui venerant The king's
ad interficiendum ipsum quod sic recesserat, dubitantes indigna- Berkeley,
tionem reginaa, ymo periculum personarum, deliberarunt istum ceaiment
praedictum porterium, extracto sibi corde, ponere in una cassia, et ato°
cor et corpus prasdicti porterii, ut corpus patris vestri, maliciosse
reginse prsesentarunt, et ut corpus regis dictus porterius in Glocestari
fuit sepultus. Et postquam exivit carceres castri antedicti fuit
receptatus in castro de Corf con socio suo, qui custodiebat ipsum in
carceribus, per dominuni Thomam castellanum dicti castri ignorante
domino, domino Johanne Maltraverse, domino dicti Thome, in quo
castro secrete fuit per annum cum dimidio. Postea audito quod Theeari

of Keiifc

comes Cancii, quia dixerat eum vivere, fuerat decapitatus, ascendit beheaded
unam navim cum dicto custode suo, et de voluntate et consilio dicti
Thomae qui ipsum receptaverat, et transivit in Yrlandum ubi fuit The kius
per viii. menses. Postea dubitans ne ibi cognosceretur, recepto Ireland,
habitu unius heremite, redivit in Angliam, et aplicuit ad portum de England,
Sandvic, et in eodem habitu transivit mare apud Sclusam. Postea ^oeVto"
direxit gressus suos in Normandiam, et de Normandia ut in pluribus Sluys
transeundo per Linguam Occitanam, venit Avinionem, ubi dato uno
floreno uni servienti pape, misit per dictum servientem unam cedulam
pape Johanni ; qui papa eum ad se vocari fecit, et ipsum secrete
tenuit honorifice ultra xv. dies. Finaliter, post tractatus diversos,
consideratis omnibus, recepta licentia, ivit Parisius, et de Parisius He goes by

-r, . i Avignon

in Braybantiam, de Braybantia in Coloniam ut videret iii. reges to Paris,

, ,. . , .. , „ , .,. . . ., Cologne, und

causa devotionis, et recedendo de Colonia per Alimamam transivit, Lombaniy.
sive perexit Mediolanum in Lombardiam, et de Mediolano intravit

526

CHRONICLES OF THE REIGNS OF

He lire* u

a hermit in
Lombanly

Examina-
tion of the
letter

Accuracy of
the fact*
detailed np
to a certain
point

Possibility
of the latter
part of the
story

quoddam heremitorium castri Milasci, in quo heremitorio stetit per
duos annos cum dimidio ; et quia dicto castro guerra supervenit,
mutavit se in castro Cecinie, in alio heremitorio diocesis Papiensis
in Lombardiam ; et fuit in isto ultimo heremitorio per duos annos
vel circa, semper inclusus, agendo penitentiam et Deum pro nobis et
aliis peccatoribus orando. In quorum testimonium sigillum con-
templatione vestre dominationis duxi apponendum. Vester Manuel
de Flisco, domini pape notarius, devotus servitor vester.' Cartul. de
Mag. Reg. A. fol. 86 vo.

This letter was discovered by M. A. Germain on a leaf of the
Cartulary of the ancient bishopric of Maguelonne, among the
departmental archives of the Heiault.1 The Cartulary in which it
was found is one drawn up in 1868 by order of Gaucelin de Deaux,
bishop of Maguelonne and treasurer to Pope Urban V.

The letter is extremely curious, and, whenever and however
written, must have been the work of some one sufficiently well
acquainted with the circumstances of the king's imprisonment to
draw up the details without giving an opening for ready refutation.
It is certain, as we have seen, that the king was at Chepstow, and
' Gesosta ' is not an improbable form for the name to take in Italian
ears. The earl of Arundel is not indeed mentioned as a partner in
the flight to Lundy, but it is not impossible that he was one of the
unlucky company, and that he may have left them after they landed ;
Henry of Lancaster was the person who captured Edward and his
companions ; the king was imprisoned at Kenilworth and there
deprived of his royal character ; he was, after the coronation of his
son on the day before Candlemas, removed to Berkeley. Thomas
de Gournai was believed to have murdered him, and in 1880 was
condemned as a traitor, while in the same parliament Simon of
Berford was executed as an acccomplice of Mortimer in his designs
against the king. The two may have been sent to Berkeley to
expedite the murder. Here the exact correspondence of the letter
with recognised fact ceases, but the later details include no im-
possibilities. Edward is said to have changed dresses with his
servant, to have killed the porter, and to have escaped to Corfe
Castle, which was then under the command of John of Maltravers.
John of Maltravers was warden of Corfe Castle on the 24th of Sep-
tember 1829, and for a year after. If the king lived there a year
and a half, from September 1827, part of this time may have been
spent under Maltravers' tenure of the office.2 It was to Corfe Castle
that the earl of Kent was induced to go in search of his brother, and
there he was assured by Sir John Deverel that he was alive, part of

1 Publications de la Societe Archeolo-
gique de Montpellier, No. 37 (Decem-

ber 1877), pp. 118-120.

* Hutch ings' Dorset, i. 504.

EDWARD I. AND EDWARD II. 527

Mortimer's scheme of alluring him to his death.1 Thus far, then,
the letter may be made to agree with the invented story. Supposing
the king to have escaped from Corfe in the spring of 1329, and
^pent eight months in Ireland, to have returned to England and
passed through Normandy by Languedoc to Avignon, he would find
John XXII. still on the papal throne ; the rest of the story is
of course incapable of being subjected to a crucial test. The
supposed writer, Manuel Fieschi, was a canon of York and had been
archdeacon of Nottingham ; 2 he may be supposed to have been
personally acquainted with Edward II. There is thus in the letter
itself little that could justify a charge of forgery. Yet the improba- improba-
bilities that forbid us to receive it as genuine are insuperable. It is some of the
impossible that John Deverel should have acknowledged that
Edward II. was alive if he had really been at Corfe in 1829. It is
impossible to suppose that by accident he told the real truth to the
earl of Kent, himself being ignorant of it. Such a coincidence is
incredible. It is impossible that John XXII., who, whatever else he Probability
may have been, was a fearless and restless pope, would have kept story i?ea
silence as to the true character of his royal visitor. It is to the last fi
degree improbable that Edward, especially after the report that he
was alive had been in circulation, should have moved about England,
France, and Italy undetected. It is by no means improbable that,
like many other kings who have died mysteriously, he should become
the hero of a tale of wonder ; but this does not explain the existence
of the letter. I can only suggest three theories to account for it : dm it be
either it was part of a political trick devised in the French court at for ?""'
the beginning of the great war to throw discredit on Edward III.
and possibly to create disaffection in England ; or it was the pre-
tended confession of some person well acquainted with the
circumstances of Edward's death and probably implicated in it, who
wished to secure his own safety and subsistence by counterfeiting
the character ; or it was the real confession of a madman. There
is great difficulty in the last supposition, for there is too much true
and consistent detail to have been arranged by a thoroughly dis-
ordered brain ; if the first be accepted, the plan of which the letter
was a part must have been so completely abortive as to be otherwise
unknown, and the second supposition seems almost as improbable as
the authenticity of the letter. There the fact remains, at present
inexplicable.

1 This part of the story is best given in Barnes's Life of Edward III.,
pp. 39-41. 2 Hardy's Le Neve, iii. 150, 168.

INDEX

ABELAUD, 51

Abingdon, 9, 14-17 33

Acre, 319, 344, 350, 351, 353-355,

357, 361, 364.
Adam Marsh, 462
Adelard, 1, 2, 4, 13, 15, 21
Adolf of Nassau, 193
Adrian IV., 30, 31
Aidan, 367
Alban, S., 30, 31
Albans, S., Assembly of, 433
Alcuin, 182
Alexander III., Pope, 37, 38, 55, 68,

69, 183, 188, 191
Alfonso the Valiant, 196; III. King

of Castile, 98, 197, 455 ; the Wise,

197
Alfred, King, 19, 33, 108, 170, 182, 369,

370

Amalric of Cyprus, 338, 341
Andrew John, vision of, 385
Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, the, 1, 15, 16,

20, 21, 373
Anjou, 176, 456, 457
Anselm, S., Ill, 112, 194, 377, 419,

459, 460, 489

Apulia, 184, 186, 189, 194, 336
Aquitaine, 201, 202, 367, 457
Aragon, 196-198
Arms, Assize of, 154, 159
Arnulf of Lisieux, 50-52, 213
Arsuf, battle of, 357, 360
Arthur, King, 6 ; of Brittany, 195,

223, 448-450

Ascalon, 354, 358, 359, 363, 364
Athelhard, 194
Athelstan, 1-6, 9, 10, 33, 34
Azai, 176, 178, 405

BADLESMEEE, 498, 499, 506, 508, 510,513

Baldwin, Archbishop, 380 seq., 385-411,

413 ; Count, 33 ; I., 328, 329, 335 ;

II., 333 ; III., 330, 333, 339 ; IV.,

339-341, 346 ; V., 339, 341

Bamberg, 182

Bannockburn, battle of, 506
Basel, Council of, 193
Beaufort, Cardinal, 193
Beaumonts of Leicester, the, 194
Becket, Thomas, 53-62, 66, 101, 103,

111, 112, 117, 139, 140, 148, 149,

150, 177, 190, 192-194, 213, 263,

264, 300, 346, 347 373, 459, 460,

470, 489

Bede, 7, 182, 368
Belmeis, Richard I., of, 43, 44; II.,

43-45, 48, 55 ; William of, 74
Benedict Biscop, 368
Benedict XI., Pope, 491
Benedictinism, 8, 9, 367-370
Berengaria, 197
Bernard, S., 262
Berwick, 508, 509
Bigod, Earl, 479
Black Prince, the, 197
Blanche of Castile, 453
Blois, Henry of, 112; Peter of, 103,

194, 217
Bohemond, 328
Bohun, Earl, 479
Bologna, 194
Boniface, S., 182, 368 ; VIII., Pope,

486, 490, 491

Boroughbridge, battle of, 499
Bostar, William, 184
Bouvines, battle of, 257.
Brabancons, the, 160, 161
Brittany, 456
Bruce, Robert, 492, 495
Brunswick, Dukes of, 192
Brunus, Thomas, 146, 194
Burghersh, 499, 500, 504
Burgundy, alliance with, 193
Byrhthelm, 14-17

CANTERBURY, 16, 17, 179, 368, 372,

373, 376 seq.
Cantilupes, the, 462, 492

M M

530

INDEX

Canute. 22. 23, 108, 182, 370
Carlisle, Parliament of, 495; Statute

of, 402, 495
Carucage of 1198, the, 150, 155, 300-

302

Castile, relations with, 166, 187, 197
Catalans, the, 161
Cedd, 367
Celestine III., 248, 272, 279, 284-286,

307, 308, 387, 418-422
Chad, 367

Chancellor, the, 138-141
Chancery, 139

Charles IV., Emperor, 193 ; V.,
Emperor, 197 ; of Anjou, 486 ; the
Great, 190; I. of England, 198
Chateau Oalllard, the, 259
Chinon, 98, 176

Circumspectc agatis, writ of, 490
Cistercians, the, 262, 263, 294, 296,

367, 380, 381, 386, 387
Clarendon, Assize of, 126-128, 133,
142, 153, 303; Constitutions of,
128, 463
Clement III., Pope, 271, 272, 396,

397, 418 ; V., Pope, 492-494
Clericis laicos, 486, 490
Clovesho, Council of, 7, 368
Cluniacs, the, 368-386
Coinage, the, 155-157
Colombieres, Conference at, 178-180
Common Pleas, Court of, 137, 138
Compostella, 19I>, 197, 203 noie
Conches, 214, 215

Confirmatio Cartarum, the, 486, 490
Conrad of Montferrat, 319, 320, 341,

342, 344, 353, 355-357, 359-363
Constance of Brittany, 450
Constance, Council of, 193
Cornhell, Henry of, 241, 243, 245
Council, the king's, 138; the Great,

161, 162, 164-166

Coutances, Walter of, 79, 81, 82, 140
note, 203, 242, 243, 255, 259, 415, 416,
435

Crowland, 368

Crusades, the, 194-196, 325 seq. ;
effects of, 364, 365 ; the first, 183 ; •
the second, 329, 331, 336, 343, 344 ;
the third, 250, 312. 345 seq.
Cunegunda, 183, 191
Cyprus, 321, 341 and note, 343, 346

DANEOELD, the, 144, 147-149, 165, 166
Danes, influence of the, 34, 108, 182,

183, 369, 370, 459
David, King of Scotland, 309 ; Earl of

Huntingdon, 450 ; Master, 64-66
De Rfligiosis, Statute, 490

Dialogus de Scaccario, tho, 80, 129,
133, 139, 144 ;to*i, 145, 295

Domesday Survey, the, 155, 184, 300,
302

Dunstan, 1-34, 370

Durham, 373

EADMER, 2, 4, 10, 15, 26, 32, 33

Edgar, 11-22, 24, 29, 34, 870

Edmund I., 3, 5, 6, 10; Ironside, 6,
190 ; S., 486, 489

Edred, 3, 10, 11, 17, 30, 33

Edward I., 39, 40, 90, 108, 193, 197,
309, 479, 486, 488 seq. ; II. 497 seq.,
505 seq. ; III. 95, 185, 186, 193, 197,
439, 499-504; the Confessor, 114,
146, 147, 149, 169, 170, 183, 370

Edwin, 33

Edwy, 11-17, 31

Egbert, Archbishop, 368

Egypt, 339, 344, 345, 352

Eleanor of Aquitaine, 96, 98, 119, 186,
187, 189, 197, 201, 223, 224, 249
251, 253, 272, 294, 418, 447-456

Elfege, 4, 5, 17

Elfsige, Bishop, 14, 15

Ethelfleda, 2-4, 19

Ethelgifu, 4, 12

Ethelred II., 21, 22, 23, 190, 439

Ethelwold, 9, 10, 17, 18, 32

Eugenius III., 43, 46, 49, 50, 194 note

Exchequer, the, 137, 144-146, 155,
156, 169, 194, 206, 207, 211, 264 ;
barons of, 154, 221, 298, 299, 300.
301

FAIR ROSAMUND, 217

Feudalism, 109-132, 331 and note

Fieschi, letter of, 524 seq.

Finnan, 367

FitzNeal, Richard, 81, 206, 237

FitzOsbert, William, 81, 298, 299

FitzPeter, Geoffrey, 203, 222, 288, 423,

427, 451, 464, 474, 483
Flanders, relations with, 12, 33, 34,

160, 161, 177, 183, 184, 186, 187, 245,

248, 252

Flemings, the, 160, 161, 176
Fleury, 9, 10, 26, 33, 182, 370
Florence of Worcester, 11, 16, 21
Fontevraud, 204
Forest, Assize of the, 143
Forneham, battle of, 160
France, relations with, 184-189
Frankpledge, view of, 123, 142
Frederick Barbarossa, 189, 190, 192,

196, 349, 350, 353; II. 193, 195,

332

INDEX

531

Fulk of Anjou, 335 note, 339, 344
Fursey, 367
Fyrd, the, 158, 159

GALL, S., 9

Gascony, 187, 197, 457, 516

Gaveston, Piers, 498, 505, 506

Oeddington, Council of, 165, 166

Genoa, 328, 346, 353

Geoffrey of Anjou, 185 ; of Brittany,

178, 180, 181, 200 ; Archbishop, 79,

242, 243, 246, 247, 254, 264, 288-

290, 413, 414, 417, 435, 442, 479,

480

Gerbert, 33
Germany, relations with, 34, 183, 189-

193, 314
Ghent, 26
Gilbert of Hastings, first bishop of

Lisbon, 196
Gilbert Foliot, 39, 46-49, 54-56, 58,

63, 64, 73
Giraldus Cambrensis, 85, 106, 146,

147, 175, 177 and note, 180, 195 note,

202,214,216,217,380,400
Glanvill, Eanulf, 135, 136, 141, 142,

170, 204, 207, 268, 290, 322, 388, 391,

397, 405, 412
Glastonbury, 4-6, 8-10, 12, 17, 24, 30,

33, 368
Godfrey of Bouillon, 327, 328, 331-334,

352

Godstow, 217

Great Assize, the, 142, 303, 305, 306
Great Privilege of Aragon, the, 198
Greek, study of, 34
Gregory VII., see Hildebrand ; VIII.,

295, 296 ; IX., 426, 486
Grosteste, 462
Guienne, 185, 188
Guy of Lusignan, 341-344, 353-357,

359

HAROLD, King, 370

Henfrid of Kerak, 356 ; of Toron, 337
and note, 338, 341 and note, 342,
362

Henry I., 99, 112, 115, 116, 120, 121,
125, 131, 146, 148, 149, 155, 168-
170, 183, 184, 190, 224, 261, 321,
454, 460, 475, 476, 483, 484 ; II.,
31, 52, 56, 79 ; foreign policy, 96^98,
99-112, 116-122 ; judicial reforms,
124-140 ; legal measures, 141-143 ;
fiscal measures, 143, 145-160, 163-
181,183, 185-197, 200, 209, 213, 214,
242, 263-267, 290, 309, 322, 346,
348, 349, 371, 386-405 seq., 443 seq.,

459, 463, 476-478, 484 ; III., 185,
195, 306, 486, 489; IV., 92; V.,
193; VI., 91; VIII.; 31, 497; IV.,
the Emperor, 31, 33, 193, 327; V.,
the Emperor, 93, 184, 190, 314;
VI., the Emperor, 195, 253, 307,
416, 458; the Lion, 190-192, 197,
314, 386 ; son of Henry II. of Eng-
land, 197, 202, 215 ; of Winchester,
213, 460

Heptarchy, the, 156

Heraclius, Patriarch, the, 398

Herbert of Middlesex, 194

Hertford, Council of, 375

Hildebrand, 31, 33, 48, 184, 459, 486

Hittin, battle of, 328, 331, 342, 344,
349, 352

Honorius HI., Pope, 486

Hospitallers, the, 353

Hubert de Burgh, 138

Hubert Walter, 111, 203, 206, 253-256,

264, 268-270, 275, 278, 279, 288,
290-304, 306, 322, 388, 404, 411,
418-435, 451, 458, 459, 463, 466,
469, 475, 477

Hugh de Puiset, 161, 207-214, 216,
242, 246, 247, 251, 255, 268, 273-
275, 281, 411-413, 435

Hugh le Despenser, the elder, 492, 498,
499, 508, 509, 512, 513-518; the
younger, 498, 499, 509-513, 515-519

Hugh of Lincoln, 41, 217, 220, 221,

265, 283, 284, 288, 293, 300, 388,
411, 434

Hugh of Nunant, 208, 210, 211, 214,
242-244, 247, 250, 251, 256, 386,
388, 398, 407, 435

INA, 7, 182

Innocent III., Pope, 286, 288, 303,

308, 387, 422, 427-429, 463, 469,

486

Ireland, 445, 446, 448
Isabella, Queen, 199, 517-517-520
Italy, relations with, 193-196
Iter of 1194, 297, 303, 304, 306
Itinerant Justices, 124-126, 130-136,

153

JAMES OF AVKSNES, 354-356
Jerusalem, 177, 325-328, 332-339,

347, 352 ; Assizes of, 332, 333
Jews, the, 218, 219
Johanna of Sicily, 166, 194, 195, 361,

362, 346, 41o
John, King, 180, 195, 204, 205, 211,

224, 241-244, 246, 248-255, 257

259, 287, 288, 290, 292, 308, 311,

582

INDEX

816, 822, 413, 433, 435, 439 seq. ;

of Salisbury, 52, 53. 57, 59 ; XII.,

Pope, 17, 28

John de Bremble, 401, 402, 405
John Gray, 466-468
John Seotns Erigena, 34
Joseph of Arimathea, 6
Judith, wife of Tostig, 190
Jury, Inquest of, 154, 155, 291, 301,

303
Justiciar, the office of the, 138-140

KENT, the Earl of, 500-503
Kynewald, 12-14, 34

LANCASTER, the house of, 193, 498-

503 ; Thomas of, 498, 499, 505-513,

516; Henry of, 500-503, 514, 516,

517
Lanfranc, 111, 194, 370,371,374, 375,

377, 458
Langton, Stephen, 111, 462, 465, 468,

470-472, 474, 483
Legnano, the battle of, 192
Leland, 40
Le Mans, 174, 175
Leopold of Austria, 254
Levant, the, 195
Lewis, d'Outremer, 34 ; IV., Emperor,

193; VII., of France, 95, 96, 98,

185, 188, 201, 211, 346, 348, 478 ;

VIII., of France, 197; XL, of France,

187

Lignages d'Outremer, 336
Lincoln, Parliament of, 506
Lindisfarne, 368, 372, 373
Lisbon, 196, 344, 348
Lombard League, the, 193, 195
London, 16, 67; Communa of, 241-

243, 482, 489, 496, 503, 516, 521-

523
Longchamp, 80, 81, 138, 140, 203,

206, 208-210, 214-223, 241-251,

253, 257, 412-414, 416, 411, 435, 459
Lords, House of, 140, 141
Lorraine, 182, 183
Lothar, the Emperor, 190
Lucius H., Pope, 194 note ; III., Pope,

73, 383
Lucy, Richard de, 39, 118, 120, 129,

130, 135, 206, 265
Lusignan, the house of, 340, 341-344,

850
Luxemburg, the house of, 193

MAONA CARTA, 171, 198, 290, 293, 294,
304, 305, 306, 476, 481-487, 512

Maine, 457

Malcolm IV. of Scotland, 165

Malmesbury, 468

Mandeville, William, 207, 209, 222

Map, Walter, 83

Margaret, Saint, 304

Matilda, wife of William the Conqueror,
190 ; wife of Henry I., 190 ; Coun-
tess, 191, 454 ; daughter of Henry I.,
191, 192

Matthew of Paris, 30, 178, 424, 440

Maurienne, county of, 445, 446

Measures, Assize of, 299

Mellitus, 367

Mepeham, Archbishop, 500, 501, 503

Mercenaries, 159, 160

Mercia, 17, 372

Mirabel, Castle of, 454 ; battle of, 456
' Monasticism, 8, 32, 370-374

Montreal, Archbishop of, 247, 329,

413, 415, 417
: Mortain. County of, 205

Mortdancestor, Assize of, 142, 303

Mortimer, 499-504
' Myton, battle of, 510

NAPOLEON BONAPARTE, 105

Navarre, 166, 187, 197

Nazareth, battle of, 342

Newburgh, William of, 153, 267

Nicholas Breakspear, 194 ; of Wor-
cester, 20

Nigel of Canterbury, 436 ; Bishop, 80,
145, 146

Niger, Ralph, 103, 149, 153

Norfolk, Earl of, 500-503

Norman Conquest, the, 181, 184, 187,
370, 371, 457, 459

Normandy, 113, 117, 118, 182, 183, 194,
196, 205 ; loss of, 456-459, 463, 480

Northampton, Council of, 58 ; Assize
of, 126, 133, 303

Northumbria, 182, 260-262

Norway, 309

Noureddin, 330, 344

Novel disseisin, Assize of, 142

Or>o, Archbishop, 10, 13, 14, 16-18,

30, 82, 367, 370
Offa, 181
Omer, S., 182
Ordinances, the, 505, 507, 510, 512,

514

Osbern, 1, 2, 4, 10, 16, 17-19, 21, 26
Oskytel, Archbishop, 18
Oswald, Bishop, 9, 10, 17, 18
Otho IV., 192, 193, 308, 313 and note,

449

INDEX

533

PALERMO, 195

Palestine, 197, 327 seq.

Patrick, S., 5, 6 ; of Salisbury, 197

Peckham, Archbishop, 490

Pembroke, Earl of, 498, 499, 507, 508,
510

Percies, the, 212, 219

Peter of Wakefield, 473

Petronella of Aragon, 147

Philippa, Queen, 503

Philip II. (Augustus) 159, 173-175,
179, 188, 246, 250, 252, 254, 255,
257, 259, 312, 315, 320, 322, 324,
349-351, 353, 356, 357, 386, 416,
452-457, 459 ; IV., 495 ; Count of
Flanders, 177, 386 ; of Swabia, 308

Pipe Bolls, 151, 296, 297

Pipewell, Council at, 206, 207

Pisa, 353

Poictou, 185, 188, 192, 201, 484

Ponthieu, 197

Portugal, 196; English connexion
with, 196, 344, 348, 350

Prsemunire, Statute of, 486

Provisors, Statute of, 486, 495

RALPH DE DICETO, 35-88
Ralph Niger, 103, 149, 153
Ramlah, battle of, 338, 339
Raymond of Tripoli, 340, 341
Rebellion of 1173-4, 117-120, 269
Reginald of Chatillon, 327, 338
Reynolds, Archbishop, 506, 520
Richard L, 80, 154, 165, 173-179, 192,
195 197, 202, 203, 207-210, 213, 216,
218, 220, 222-224, 246-256, 273-287,
290, 311-325, 353-364, 407 seq.,
462; of Almain, 193; of Devizes,
222, 223 ; of Syracuse, 194
Robert of Chesnei, 52, 55
Roger of Apulia, 336 ; of York, Arch-
bishop, 268
Rollo, 456

Roses, the Wars of, 504
Rudolf of Hapsburg, 193

SALADIN, 321, 324 and note, 325, 331,
337, 338, 342, 345, 353, 354, 357-
364, 458 ; Tithe, 153, 154, 165, 295

Salisbury, Herbert of, 288, 300 ; Robert
of, 194 ; Roger of, 112, 145

Sauinur, 177-179

Savoy, 196

Saxony, 183

Scotland, 165, 492, 494, 502, 505-510

Scutage, 151, 152, 157, 158

Sheriff, the, 123, 130, 133, 136, 142,

144, 149, 154, 155, 207, 208, 211, 216,

221, 224, 301, 303
Sheriffs, Inquest of, 128
Sibylla, 340 seq., 356
Sicily, 186, 193-195, 223, 307, 362
Sigismund, the Emperor, 193
Simon de Montfort, 185, 197, 198
Spain, relations with, 187, 188, 196-

199, 453

Standard, battle of, 159
Stapleton, Bishop, 520-522
Stephen, King, 99, 112, 115, 124, 146,

156, 190, 196, 205, 262, 454, 460
Stratford, Archbishop, 462, 499-504,

520
Swithun, S., 20, 369

TALLIAGES, 150, 152

Tancred, 195, 328, 339

Templars, the, 353

Theobald, Archbishop, 54, 57, 150, 379,

419, 459

Theodore, Archbishop, 368, 375
Thurstan, Archbishop, 262
Tickhill, honour of, 205, 206
Toeny, Roger of, 196
Toulouse, 151, 158, 165, 187, 188, 202,

203, 477

Touraine, 456, 457
Trussel, Sir W., 502, 503, 514
Tyre,.353-357, 369

URBAN III., Pope, 349, 380, 383, 384,
387, 389-395, 397, 418, 419

VAUCOULEURS, 259
Venice, 328, 343, 346
Vexin, the, 188, 456
Vezelai, 351
Villehardouin, 332, 336
Villeins, 169, 170

WALES, 475

Wallace, William, 492

Wallingford, Treaty of, 155, 160;
honour of, 205, 206

Warenne, Earl, 508, 509, 511, 516

Welf of Tuscany, 191 ; of Bavaria, 191

Wilfrid, S., 30, 367

William the Conqueror, 98, 108, 112-
114, 121, 126, 144, 147, 170, 261,
331, 370, 371, 489 ; Rufus, 98, 115,
121, 144, 169, 439, 458, 460, 477,
484, 489; the Good of Sicily, 116,
193-195, 358, 386, 415; the Lion,
97, 165, 192, 269, 270, 308, 469 ; of

684 INDEX

Malrnesbury, 1, 6,7, 9, 24, 29; Woodstock, Council of, 148, 149;

Marsha), 206, 207, 242, 278, 451, Decree of,162; Assize of, 806

464 ; of Tyre, 888, 849 ; of Wyke- I Wiirzburg, Diet of, 191

bam, 462 ; de Testa, 443-447 ; of Wnlfric, 2, 8

Winchester, 192 Wulfstan, S., 460

Willibald, 5, 7, 182 Wycliffe, 198
Winchelsey, Archbishop, 462, 488-494,

496, 497

Winchester, 10, 16-18 ; Statute of, ' YORK, Massacre, of 218 ; Province of,

306 260-266

WOTTBWOODK AND CO. LTD., NrW-STRKET SQUARE
LONDON

With Photogravure Portrait. Crown Svo. Gs. net.

OBDINATION ADDBESSES

By the Right Rev. WILLIAM STUBBS, D.D.

LATE LORD BISHOP OP OXFORD.

Edited by E. E. HOLMES,

VICAK OF SONNING; FORMERLY DOMESTIC CHAPLAIN TO THE BISHOP; HON. CANON OK
CHRIST CHURCH.

THE DIACONATB — THE ORDINATION QUESTIONS — THE RESPONSIBILITY OF
THE CALL — OUR MISSION — THE CHURCH— THE WORLD — THREE ADDRESSES
ON THE HOLY SCRIPTURES — THE REAL PRESENCE — SELF- DEDICATION —
Two ADDRESSES ON THINGS NATURAL AND THINGS SPIRITUAL— DIFFI-
CULTIES— REWARDS— UNREALITY — FBAR AND POWERS — LET NO MAN
DESPISE THEE— THE NEGATIVE SIDE OF SELF-SURRENDER— A CASTAWAY —
ST. THOMAS.

CHURCH QUARTERLY REVIEW.

' We do not know what book we could place in the hands of an ordination
candidate which would be more likely than this to impress him with the seriousness
and the blessedness of his calling, and we can hardly rate too highly the value of
what the Bishop has to say about the three great subjects of episcopacy, the New
Testament conception of the unity of the Church, and the doctrine of the Sacraments — •
matters which those who accept the Bishop's teaching will hold very dear when they
are invited to promote re-union by intercommunion.'

THE PILOT.

' On the practical side the addresses are full of weighty counsel. Individuality
of faithfulness, without which the most eloquent preaching of sermons, the most
zealous conduct of missions, the most splendid manifestations of administrative
power are in vain, is the dominant note of all the addresses. Constant intimate
visitation, constant prayer and intercession for individual souls, these are the
necessities of the pastoral life on which the bishop dwelt with earnest reiteration.
His addresses are, indeed, those of a true pastor.'

GUARDIAN.

' Whether he is talking of self-dedication or of the Real Presence, of the
obligation of the daily offices, of the paramount necessity of individual parish visita-
tion, of the power and breadth of the Collects, of the beauty of " that blessed book,"
the " Imitatio Christi," of the place of the Holy Scriptures in the life of the Church
and the individual, he is always clear, earnest, powerful, uncompromising in the
assertion of his beliefs. . . . We need not say how greatly the book will be yalued
by those who were ordained by the late Bishop. But it will have a much wider
mission. It will do work of value, we are confident, for the whole Church.'

THE CHURCH TIMES.

1 ... these deeply spiritual utterances addressed to young men, which tell us of
a heart in sympathy with the difficulties as well as aspirations of those whom he was
addressing.'

CHURCH REVIEW.

' The addresses are the outcome of a mature experience, and the utterances of
one who watched and knew the trend of thought in the younger men of the day, and
are marked by an earnestness and fatherly affection which, cannot have failed to make
a deep impression upon those ordained in the Diocese of Oxford during Bishop
Stubbs' episcopacy.'

CHURCHMAN.

' One outstanding characteristic is at once manifest : they deal directly with their
subject. They speak to men of their call to the office of the ministry, of the quali-
fications of the candidate, of his temptations, of his inner life, and of his future
trials. We cannot imagine a devout candidate for Holy Orders reading this volume
without being helped by it.1 s^^^^^^^r^r

LONGMANS, GREEN", & CO. 39 Paternoster Row, London,
New York and Bombay.

-TV OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY, LOS ANGELES

iili&s—

College
Library

17$
S93